


Ice Cream (and sweeter things)

by lilaliacs



Category: Produce 101 (TV), Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, M/M, Mentioned bullying, Mutual Pining, Panic Attacks, Slice of Life, Slow Burn, Social Anxiety, i dont believe in sadness, last few tags are just for warning theres not a lot of it, or nuclear families, or straight people
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-11-14
Packaged: 2019-01-15 08:34:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 64,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12317481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilaliacs/pseuds/lilaliacs
Summary: "This conversation is going in circles and has so for weeks can we get over it yet?""No we can't." Daehwi shot back."Why not?""Because he has a big gay crush on him." Somi and Guanlin recited at the same time. "Even though he might be an asshole. We can't be sure." Guanlin added.





	1. part i

Daehwi 

"It makes no sense, Jinyoung." Daehwi dejectedly let the slice of pizza he had been holding drop back into the box.

"Every white Hollywood romcom ever says he should be all over me, Jinyoung. He's the captain of the soccer team. The only thing keeping me from being head cheerleader is that our school does not have a cheer squad, Jinyoung. It makes no sense. We're a match made in heaven. What's stopping us?"

"Heteronormativity.", Somi answered, while Jinyoung picked up Daehwi's discarded slice of pizza, seemingly deciding that it deserved more attention than his best friend right now. 

"Also you have never talked to him before", Guanlin chimed in from across his living room table. 

"And you would be a terrible cheer captain, even if we had a squad. Which you wouldn’t join by the way, because you’re too busy doing nerd things.", Somi added. 

When Daehwi glared at her and opened his mouth to start and defend his non existent cheerleading career though, she smiled innocently, as if she hadn't said anything. "I mean, Guanlin is right. He could be a douche, you know?" 

That made Daehwi forget the honour he had never sworn on his pom poms he never owned.

"He's not a douche", he said instead, followed by a deep sigh. "I wish he were, that would make this all so much easier."

Somi raised an eyebrow. "How exactly would him being a terrible human being make the part where you have a big gay crush on him any easier?" 

"I wouldn't have a big gay crush on him if he was a terrible human being." Daehwi explained, matter-of-factly. 

Guanlin clapped his hands once. "That's the point though, you don't know what he's like. He could be a huge asshole or the nicest human being on earth and you simply wouldn't know. Schrödinger's douchebag." 

"And you won't find out which one he is, unless you talk to him." Somi concluded.

"Well, I can't just go and talk to him." 

"Why not?"

"Because he has a big gay crush on him", Jinyoung repeated, setting the pizza box aside. "This conversation is going in circles and has so for weeks can we get over it yet?" 

"No we can't." Daehwi shot back. 

"Why not?" 

"Because he has a big gay crush on him." Somi and Guanlin recited at the same time. "Even though he might be an asshole. We can't be sure." Guanlin added. 

"That's what you missed in the last two minutes or so when you were busy making heart eyes at the pizza. Also Somi insulted my cheerleading skills. Opinions?"

Jinyoung was Daehwi's last hope on actually useful advice. He hadn't actually had any hope in Somi and Guanlin to begin with, so really, Jinyoung was his only hope. But, as he had for the last few weeks, Jinyoung rolled his eyes. That's all he ever did, rolling his eyes. Daehwi felt like they needed to have a serious talk about respect and basic conversational etiquette, but right now he was too busy clinging on to the tiny spark of a thought that maybe, possibly, Jinyoung had finally found the answer to all the questions Daehwi had ever asked in his life. Jinyoung lifted a hand to count off his statements when he started talking.  
"First of all, you never had cheer training, so Somi definitely has a point there, even though I personally think you have the right mindset for it. We don't have a cheer squad though, so we will probably never find out who's right. Second, I'm pretty sure Woojin is not an asshole. Third, can we get over it yet?"

"How do you know he's not, you also have never talked to him." Guanlin pointed out. He was very set on his theory and it was starting to get to Daehwi. 

If he was honest with himself he didn't even know when this crush started, or why for that matter. Jinyoung would probably say that it was due to Daehwi's obsession with unrealistic romance driven Hollywood movies. Jinyoung would also probably know exactly when this whole ordeal had started since he had been the one to sit through countless conversations just like this one ever since, and Daehwi could have asked him, but he got enough sighs and eye-rolls from his best friend as it was. He'd rather not inflict additional ones on himself. 

So what if Guanlin was right and Woojin _was_ an asshole? Or simply not who Daehwi made him out to be?  
Daehwi was not even sure what exactly he made him out to be, there were only bits and pieces of information about the boy whirring around his head that somehow, at some point, had combined into one of the most unreasonable and cheesiest highschool crushes known to mankind. Here Daehwi was, playing the piano for the drama club since middle school, trusted by a multitude of teachers, spending his afternoons and evenings hanging out with his group of precisely three friends who rather judged him for his life decisions than help him with his problems instead of going to parties that served alcohol none of them were old enough to drink. And there Woojin was, a student athlete, friends with Park Jihoon, which together equaled to Friends With The Whole School, grades above average and the sweetest smile Daehwi had ever seen in his entire life, invited to each and everyone of those parties. Daehwi didn’t think Woojin’s friends cared about whether they were old enough or not to drink the alcohol there.  
Everytime he was reminded of the fact that he and Woojin were basically strangers he felt extremely hypocritical, because this was not how this was supposed to be. He was in his third year of highschool and Daehwi deserved a cheesy love-story with mutual pining, stolen glances in the school hallways and lots of side-plots that would eventually all resolve on prom night with a big spontaneous musical number. What he was getting right now was Jinyoung complaining when Daehwi dragged him to soccer games every few weeks and whining over pizza with his friends. He didn't even know if Woojin could sing. 

"What does it have to do with anything that he can sing or not?" Somi interrupted his thoughts. 

"We don't judge people by their ability to hold a tune, Daehwi, how often do I have to tell you this?" Jinyoung shook his head, acting disappointed. 

"First of all I know that, I hang out with Guanlin after all" ,Daehwi countered, trying to cover up his embarrassment about accidentally voicing his thoughts out loud and getting a light hit on the back of his head from Guanlin in return. "Second of all I want to talk about something else now." 

As always when realisation hit him that his epic romantic love story with Woojin was rooted in the fact that Daehwi idealised the idea of him, he grew sick of himself and the subject really quickly. 

"Oh thank god" ,Jinyoung exclaimed. He didn't actually start talking about anything else afterwards, just gave his attention to the rest of pizza still in the box and left the other three to do the talking. Sometimes Daehwi wondered if Jinyoung secretly thought about musical numbers too, when his friends annoyed him. He hoped he had a catchy solo number in his best friend's imaginary musical. He hoped he had a cheesy romance plot too. He wondered who his love interest in Jinyoung’s musical was. Maybe he should ask Jinyoung at one point, he felt like his best friend could very well be capable of psychic predictions. Hopefully his love interest was sweet and caring and a balancing calm to the colourful chaos Daehwi thought himself to be. Maybe he had a dazzling smile, that showed his adorable snaggletooth whenever he laughed. 

As he turned to join Guanlin's and Somi's heated discussion about 2000's fashion that had seemingly started out of nowhere, he sighed inwardly. There were two options for him, he decided then and there. 

1.He would get over this whole thing within the next few weeks, just sit his ass down and have a stern talk with himself, to once and for all understand that it had no point to keep dwelling on his crush. He could not keep doing this to himself, to his friends, even to Woojin to some extent. It just was not fair on anybody involved. He would just focus on more important things in life, more realistic ones. His story did not need a big gay romance to be complete. 

But this thought made him sad. Daehwi was a hopeless romantic, give or take unreasonable obsessions with boys out of his league.  
Maybe his story just didn’t need _this_ big gay romance. 

2\. He would do the exact opposite. Instead of sitting and dwelling on not knowing whether his feelings were misplaced he would do what Somi had suggested earlier. Just talk to Woojin. Get to know him. The prospect of the carefully constructed wonderful and perfect concept Woojin was in his mind being shattered scared him to some extent. But at the same time he knew that it was the only right thing to do. 

Daehwi made his peace with these two options then and there, while Somi tried to list all the reasons why extremely low cut pants should be banned from produce. He would simply wait and see what life threw at him, what coincidence decided should be happening.  
He thought that Jinyoung would be glad not having to listen to his whining anymore. He was that much closer to the solo in Jinyoung’s imaginary musical, as well as to peace and quiet for his poor, tired heart, or at least that was what he thought.

Woojin 

“What do we think about...Space? Stars? Rocket ships. _Aliens, guys_ ” 

Jihoon had the habit of not only carrying each and every inner debate out loud, but also needing at least one other person there for it at all times. _One other person_ usually meant Woojin. Woojin usually tried to force Sohye to join them for emotional support. Sohye usually suddenly remembered her grandmother needed her help cleaning out her basement. Woojin knew exactly that Sohye’s grandmother did not have a basement, but Sohye could be very convincing. 

Since Sohye had cleaned up her grandmother’s non-existent basement the last time Jihoon had asked for assistance, and Woojin had come prepared this time, Sohye was now stuck next to him in a booth at their favourite café. Jihoon was separated from them by not only the table but also approximately 26 colourful notebooks, twice as many different coloured pens, a huge bowl of ice cream for the three of them and thousands of crumpled up pieces of paper covered in Jihoon’s handwriting.  
“I want to die”, Sohye whispered, only for Woojin to hear. Louder, she said: “Aliens sound interesting.” 

Jihoon normally didn’t need anyone to actually talk to him when he was planning something. At one point Woojin had tried to find out just how ridiculous his answers could get until Jihoon dropped out of his trance and reacted to them. His experiment had stopped after Jihoon’s reply to Woojin telling him about his torrid affair with their middle aged, married drama teacher had been an explanation on why exactly the cafeteria should be giving out free peaches to the 5th and 6th graders. Not because that had been the last straw, but because Donghyun, a waiter in the café as well as their friend, who had visited said teacher's drama class only a year ago, had told him discreetly while putting down a cup of tea in front of him, that he was quite surprised by this revelation, seeing as he was very aware of the fact that the teacher would be retiring next year.  
“You know, Mrs. Romaine is a wonderful woman and all but also she’s 60 and I didn’t think she’d have this kind of...effect.” 

Woojin had briefly considered to never talk to Donghyun ever again, to never visit the café ever again, to move to Peru and change his name, but he’d settled on telling Donghyun that it was an obscure inside joke and giving up on Jihoon.  
In any way, the sentiment of wanting immediate death was definitely a relatable one in this situation, so he gave Sohye a sympathetic smile, while Jihoon tried to come up with the perfect way to make the entire Bonfire Night space-themed. 

“We could have food that looks like it’s from another planet. That’s a thing right? There was punch with eyeballs in it at your Halloween party in 5th grade, Sohye, right? Something like that. Just less eyeballs, more space rocks.” 

“Woojin, remember how Jihoon screeched when he saw the eyeballs?” 

“Yoojung jumped and fell off the couch and Yewon nearly started crying because it was so loud.” 

“So the food could definitely be taken care of. Decorations would be fairly easy too we could get the art teachers to force the middle schoolers to craft planets. And there's this type of lights that project constellations on walls! Wait. No. We’ll be outside. There’ll be no walls. But maybe we could still use them!” 

Jihoon stopped to scrawl down some notes on the notebook in front of him right now, a huge one with soft apple green pages. Presumably about constellation-projecting lights. 

Woojin did not think the lights were necessary. Bonfire Night was held in summer on a wide field close to campus. There’d be real stars and constellations literally right above their heads once the sun set. But he also knew that in his frenzy, Jihoon tended to forget basic laws of nature, and that he would not listen to Woojin anyways, so he had to keep his thoughts concerning this important detail of the big night to himself. 

Bonfire Night was their highschool’s most treasured tradition, and it didn't necessarily involve a bonfire. It was simply the name of the end of year party that had stuck throughout school history. It also had stuck that the senior class of every year were the ones in charge of planning the event. The class of 2018 was more than happy to put this responsibility on their class president’s shoulders and Jihoon in return was more than happy to regularly force his best friends to join him for ice cream and one sided conversations. Woojin and Sohye would be more than happy to eat the mountains of ice cream Jihoon paid for but were stuck with too many pens in pastel colours in front of them to truly appreciate the free food. Which meant that they still ate it, but they were certain that they could be having more fun while doing it. 

With a loud thud and without warning, Jihoon suddenly closed the notebook in his hands. 

“Can you do me a favour?” , he directed at nobody in particular. Sohye was busy shoveling chocolate chip ice cream into her mouth, and Woojin was busy trying to find out how small he could fold a paper napkin, but since his mouth wasn’t occupied he figured he had to be the one to acknowledge this rare chance at conversation with Jihoon over his plans. 

“Sure, buddy. What is it?” 

Jihoon sorted through the notebooks in front of him and eventually grabbed a light blue one with drawings of fruit on it. 

“We will need help from the Juniors for some things. I mean, we don’t _need_ it because obviously we could do this by ourselves, no problem, but the school likes to see the organisation of these things to be some kind of school spirit teamwork building excersise.” 

Woojin thought it was endearing that Jihoon kept saying “we”, as if the rest of their class weren’t glad to put all the formalities of the Bonfire in Jihoon’s capable hands and not have anything to do with it that exceeded attending. 

“Anyways, I actually think we could use the Juniors for music and stuff. We need a really good playlist, you know? By which I mean we can’t just ask any Junior to help us. I have a list of people I considered on the very first page here.” 

He turned to the first page of the blue notebook and handed it to Woojin. Barely readable, it held a list of give or take 5 names, that Woojin assumed belonged to people in the grade below them. 

“Five people?” , he asked. “That’s how far the school spirit team building goes?” 

“That’s how far it goes.” Jihoon confirmed with a firm nod. “One or two of them would be enough too, you don’t need that many people to put songs on a list.” 

Woojin knew all too well that his best friend preferred to work alone on every project thrown his way. These meetings were the best example for it. So he was not surprised that Jihoon kept to the school’s guidelines concerning this topic as minimalistic as possible. 

“So what do you need us for in this?” ,he pushed on, remembering that Jihoon had originally started this conversation with asking for a favour. 

“Oh I just need one of you to talk to these people and see who’ll do it.” 

“I’m sure Woojin will have lots of fun doing that.”, Sohye piped up, letting her spoon drop into the bowl and giving a saccharine smile. 

“I’m sure Woojin will not.”, Woojin countered, mirroring Sohye’s expression. 

Sohye ignored him in order to turn to Jihoon and explain to him either why exactly Woojin needed to do this, or why she under no circumstances would be able to do it. Which both had the same outcome in the end: Woojin’s suffering. 

After Jihoon had been convinced that Woojin was indeed the most fit for this job of utmost importance ( “He’s the soccer captain, Jihoon, people know him, people trust him. Look at his smile, how can you say no to this smile?” Woojin had been glaring at her.) ,he left the soft blue fruit-print notebook in his best friend’s care. While gathering all his other materials into his obscenely colourful backpack, he explained to Woojin that he first needed to actually find a Junior to do the job, then brief them on the contents of the notebook. (Which apparently was the Official Music Notebook, not to be mistaken for the Other Official Music Notebook that held mostly information about sound engineering) 

The whole job was easy enough, and Woojin was happy to help at least this little bit with preparations, but only theoretically. In reality he did not look forward at all to talk to people he did not know about things he knew barely anything about. One glance at the pages of the notebook filled with Jihoon’s impossible mess of a handwriting told him that even consulting these notes wouldn’t give him a better picture on what to do. 

When he voiced these concerns to Sohye after Jihoon had left to do important things the future president of this country had to do, her reaction was only an apologetic smile as she pushed over the remnants of ice cream as a peace offering. There was no need for a peace offering, really, since Woojin wasn’t angry at her for leaving him to rot with this colourful fruity notebook, but he finished off the ice cream while Sohye packed up to leave anyways. 

When he voiced his concerns again a few minutes later, to Donghyun this time, all he got was a sympathetic pat on the head. “I know you’re not a people person but always remember that underclassmen are more scared of you than you are of them. Who knows, maybe you’ll make new friends.” 

“I was never scared of you.” Woojin reminded him.

“That’s because I’m nice and unthreatening.” Donghyun smiled and left for the kitchen.

Despite Donghyun’s words, Woojin somehow could not find the thrill in the possibility to update his social circles, and even less still in the steps he’d have to take to get there at all. 

It was only him, his people issues, and the way too cheerful smiling watermelon at the front cover of this notebook now. 

___________________

 

Woojin had seen enough random wildlife documentaries in his life to theoretically know the precautions one would have to take when breaching unknown terrain.  
He was not sure, however, if these precautions could be applied to the area of the school building where the Juniors resided. Sure, it was unknown terrain to him, but something told him that a rope and night vision goggles would not help him survive this mission. 

After deciphering the ancient murals that lead him to start this dangerous journey (Jihoon’s handwriting), he had taken it upon himself to go about the complicated process it would be (waiting for a free period and taking the 3 minute walk through the school building). After initially arriving at his destination, the ancient sanctuary of this foreign culture (the room closest to the outdoor basketball field) he had encountered one of the habitants (Woojin was pretty sure his name was Dongbin) and asked him to be taken to their leader (“Uh...who’s in charge here?”).  
The Junior equivalent to Jihoon was, apparently, Lee Euiwoong, who Woojin vaguely recalled was dating one of his friends, Hyungseob, and despite that right off the bat Woojin didn’t trust him. How did someone with a face as cute as this rise so high in the hierarchy of a place as cruel as high school? Then he thought about how Jihoon had been mistaken for a 14-year-old at the movies the week prior and he realised that maybe a baby face was just required for a position of power around here. 

He briefly explained to Euiwoong what exactly it was he needed, only stumbling over his words twice, which he decided to count as a success. The Junior, justified his suspicious babyface though may be, still made him uneasy. This had, of course, nothing to do with Woojin’s disastrous social skills and the fact that all strangers between ages 12 and 78 terrified him. Absolutely not. Euiwoong just had a very intimidating air about him for a 16 year old with adorable ears sticking out beneath his beanie. 

“So who did Jihoon have in mind?”, Euiwoong further prompted, shaking Woojin out of his trance and the victory dance he had been doing in his head. 

The small notebook with the fruit-print, his only weapon of defense in this vast and foreign landscape, held a couple of names in an order that Woojin had assumed had some kind of point behind it, which is why he asked for the name at the very top first. 

“Kyla Massie?” 

Euiwoong nodded. “Yeah she’s great at music and stuff. But if you want to get things done soon she’s probably not who you want to put in charge of this. She’s not in school at the moment, I think she caught a nasty case of the flu.” 

“Yikes.” Woojin uttered, then realised it might not be the sensible thing to say and added: “I hope she feels better soon.” 

Euiwoong did not seem too hung up on his manners, though, instead sending an inquiring look at the fruity stationery abomination in Woojin’s hands. “Who else do you got?” 

“Jeon Somi. Or Sunny.” He had not been able to tell for the life of him. For someone with a knack to write down and plan every little detail of life in lists and flashy diagrams Jihoon should really put more thought into his penmanship. 

“Somi! She’s right over there.” Euiwoong nodded in the general direction to their left, where a group of tables were occupied by a bunch of Juniors. Woojin started looking for the girl in question, until after a few moments he realised that he had absolutely no idea what she actually looked like. 

Euiwoong, bless his soul, tried to help him when he saw the undoubtedly lost look in Woojin’s eyes. “She’s with Daehwi.” 

Woojin also had no idea what Daehwi looked like,only recognized the name as possibly the next one on Jihoon’s list, but at this point he was ready to end this conversation, pretend, and just find out who he actually had to talk to by trial and error. The boy in charge here seemed not up for dealing with such unprofessionalism on his turf though, because he barely suppressed a sigh, grabbed a hold of Woojin’s hoodie and dragged him over to the group of tables. 

“Jeon, I have work for you.”, he announced, and apparently that was where his duties ended because he turned on his heel and left poor Woojin alone with yet another pair of strangers.  
The girl in question did not seem phased by that though and replied even though Euiwoong probably did not hear her: “Finally my family doesn’t have to starve anymore!” 

She used an old kind of accent that made her sound like a housewife from two centuries ago and Woojin would have loved to ask her where she learned to do that, but currently he was too busy trying to think of what he had to say in a way that wouldn’t embarrass him, his whole family, and Jihoon and Sohye in extension. 

“Uh.” Was the eloquent solution he came up with after he realised Somi, as well as the boy next to her (Daehwi ?) were looking at him expectantly. There was a third boy sitting with them, his eyes focused on the textbook in front of him instead of Woojin, which Woojin gladly used as an opportunity to focus on the top of the third boy’s ash blond hair for a moment and not on the judging eyes of his peers.  
(Woojin didn’t actually think they were judging him, the nagging voice at the back of his head though was convinced that they were already planning his public execution or something. Because apparently that was the only possible outcome for this encounter.) 

“I’m Woojin” ,he tried again. 

“Oh, you play soccer, right?”, Daehwi threw in before he could say more, and flashed him a gummy smile, that grew impossibly wider when Woojin nodded. 

“Well, what brings you here, Woojin?” Somi took over, with a just as wide grin. Either they were just genuinely friendly people or they were in on an exclusive joke at Woojin’s expense. The voice in his head thought the second option to be the one more likely. Maybe there was something on his face? 

He realized that he had yet to answer Somi’s question. 

“Bonfire night.” he stated, and lifted up Jihoon’s notebook as if that would explain things. Instead of making him look like someone who took important notes and had his life together though, it probably just made him look like an idiot. The cartoon watermelon was laughing at him again. 

“Oh that’s the big end of year party thing, right?” Daehwi, again, asked before Woojin could say more. He turned his excited smile towards the third boy and nudged his shoulder to get his attention. The textbook was apparently very interesting. “You told me about that a few months ago, didn’t you?” 

The blond boy seemed to be very unwilling to interrupt his studying when he slowly peeled his eyes away from the page they had been glued to for the last 5 minutes and looked up at Daehwi instead. Woojin wished he could muster up as much motivation for studying at least once in his life. 

“What?” he inquired softly. 

Somi took it upon herself to answer. 

“Woojin here came to talk to us about bonfire night.”, she explained with another wide smile towards the Senior in question. 

He still was not prepared enough to deal with the undivided attention of three underclassmen, so Woojin’s attempt at a socially acceptable form of reaction to this when the third boy looked at him for the first time since he got here ended in anything but that. Awkward fingerguns had to be at the very bottom of the list of socially acceptable reactions to anything. 

“Euiwoong said that there was a job for Somi involved so possibly he’s here to ask for help with Bonfire Night.” Daehwi added. Which, again, reminded Woojin that he still had not done what he was actually here for. 

He tentatively smiled at all three of them and again, without any impact, pointed to the notebook in his hands. 

“Jihoon - our class president- he asked me to look for you guys.” ,he started. No major catastrophes yet.  
“He said he needs help with general music stuff. I mean, he said he doesn’t need help. Jihoon never needs help. The principal said that he was supposed to let the Juniors help, he’s not liking the idea very much but he has to, you know- wait. Wait, that sounds really mean. He’s not a mean guy, he just hates working with people.” 

Speaking of major catastrophes. 

“Uhm. What I’m trying to say is he gave me this list of people to ask and, uh. Somi is here. So is Daehwi. You can work together ...and with other people too, of course. This is highschool, not the military. You don’t have to do anything. You don’t even have to help at all, I’m just supposed to ask if you would, so...Yes.” 

This was precisely the reason why he never had to present anything to any class ever. Teachers usually wanted to spare themselves, their students and especially Woojin with the experience.

Against all odds, Somi’s and Daehwi’s expressions never fell while he was getting more and more caught up in the disastrous threads of his own words. If anything, the dark haired boy’s smile grew even wider, Woojin was pretty sure he had a clear view of all of the other’s teeth. 

“I’m sure Somi and Daehwi would _love_ to help you out” ,he announced. “Wouldn’t you love to do that Daehwi?” 

Woojin took a moment to realize two things. 

The boy he had thought was Daehwi was either not Daehwi, or liked to talk about and to himself in third person. The second option seemed rather unlikely and Woojin quietly thanked all forces responsible that he didn’t do anything that would’ve made the Juniors aware of his mix-up. He embarrassed himself enough as it was.  
The actual Daehwi (he assumed the third boy was the actual Daehwi, he didn’t trust anyone anymore and definitely not his own conclusions) had not answered his friends question yet. He and Somi seemed to be stuck in either an intense spontaneous staring contest or an equally intense telepathic discussion. Whatever it was ended after a few more seconds and Somi was the next to speak up. 

“Well, I for one would really love to help you guys out. But I have this reoccurring headache at the moment and the doctor told me to avoid listening to music as much as possible for a few weeks, so I really, really can’t. I’m so sorry. But, like Guanlin said, I’m sure Daehwi would love to do it, he’s a worthy replacement for me.” 

She flashed a saccharine smile that somehow managed to be apologetic and suspicious at the same time, but Woojin did not give it a lot of thought. Instead he turned to Daehwi with the same tentative smile as before. 

“Do you want to do it? I understand if you don’t want to do it alone. Or at all, that’s fine too, I have more people on this list. For both. I mean if you don’t want to do it alone I can give you the list and you can choose who you want to do it with yourself. Or you just choose without the list because this is a free country and you don’t have to let lists dictate your life, that would be stupid. Not stupid of you, just in general. Or you don’t choose at all, like I said you really don’t have to if you don’t -” Woojin had begged his mouth to shut up five chaotic sentences before, but the dumb thing just liked to see him suffer. What eventually made him stop was Daehwi himself, interrupting him. Woojin didn’t think he ever felt thankful for someone doing that but right now he did, very much so. 

“No, I’ll do it, don’t worry about it!” Daehwi piped up. 

Woojin took a moment to gather his thoughts as well as the surprise that despite doing a terrible job at appealing the project to the Juniors, they somehow still were willing to take part in it. Maybe they really just were genuinely friendly and never planned his premature demise at their own hands. 

“Really? That’s great! Uhm…” The bell signaling the end of Woojin’s free period rang before he could remember what he was supposed to be doing now. What he did remember was that he had to be in history class 5 minutes from now, and that class took place on the other side of campus.  
“Listen, I have to run,”, he directed at the trio in front of him, while hurriedly looking for an unoccupied page in the blue notebook. “But uh, you can text me later today and I’ll tell you more, okay?” 

He ripped out the page he had just scrawled his number on and pushed it into Daehwi’s hands while simultaneously trying to stuff the book itself back into his backpack. He was still trying to master this seemingly impossible task when he shot the three of them yet another unfortunate finger gun and quickly made his exit, without another word and anything but graceful. 

Only when he stumbled into his history classroom did he realize that it may have been better if he had given Daehwi Jihoon’s number, and also that Jihoon might kill him for carelessly ripping out a page of one of his sacred notebooks. 

But he would have to deal with all of that later, right after he handled the fact that his history teacher was already glaring at him and expectantly asked him for homework he definitely had not done. 

Daehwi

 

Daehwi would have loved to get a breather, to just get up then and there, go hide in some janitor’s closet and possibly never talk to his friends again. But fate had other plans.  
Fate, in this case, was Jinyoung, who stepped through the door the second Woojin left and only narrowly avoided a collision between them. Woojin did not seem to notice, still busy fighting with either his backpack, or the colourful book he had been holding the whole time, or both. 

The same book that had a page less than a minute before, a page that was now laying on the table in front of Daehwi. It probably would have stayed there, untouched, because he was very much convinced that nothing that had just happened was real and neither was the piece of paper. If he touched it it would crumple to dust, as would the imagination that he had just _actually talked_ to Woojin. 

Actually, he reminded himself, Somi and Guanlin had talked to him. And it was also Somi and Guanlin who took the initiative at this moment, Guanlin snatching the piece of paper away from Daehwi and Somi reaching for his phone in the pocket of his jacket. By the time Guanlin was done reading the numbers out loud to Somi and she had put Daehwi’s phone securely back into its designated place, Daehwi himself still had not moved and Jinyoung was seated across from them, eyebrow raised and ready for answers Daehwi did not have.

“What did I miss?” 

Before the horror twins could embarrass Daehwi more than they already had that day, he willed his whirring thoughts to a stop and replied: “Somi gave me a bruise. I thought she was going to break my leg.” 

Said leg had fallen victim to an onslaught of hits as soon as Somi had spotted Woojin entering the room earlier. A questionably subtle and definitely painful attempt to bring that fact to Daehwi’s attention.

“I’ll go and see if it’s still working and take a walk. See you in maths!”, he added, gathered his stuff as quickly as he could and walked out with as much dignity as he could muster. 

It was not that he did not want to talk to Jinyoung. In fact he would have preferred to talk to Jinyoung over Somi and Guanlin. Daehwi just did not want to talk about it in general because he did not really know what to say.

Looking at it objectively, nothing important had happened really. Sure, he had finally talked to Woojin, sure, it had been a catastrophe, sure, Somi and Guanlin made him consider transferring schools and never talk to anyone he has known up until now again, and yes, sure, the cliche protagonist of a romantic drama in Daehwi was going nuts right at this second because this was where the romance plot finally, finally started.  
But the newfound realistic outlook on the situation that Daehwi had gathered just last week reminded him that this had just been a regular conversation, albeit a rather cringey one. It didn’t mean he and Woojin would be happily married in 10 years with two kids and a dog, nor did it do anything to confirm or deny Daehwi’s own feelings.  
What it did do was confirm Jinyoung’s hypothesis: Woojin did not seem to be an asshole. He did also not seem to be the untouchable god that Daehwi had thought him to be sometimes. He was just a highschooler, terrible with words and surprisingly keen to not upset others, or at least that’s what it had seemed like to Daehwi. 

Alas, objectivity was a trait that Daehwi did not have for long periods of time. He made it about ten minutes out of the juniors’ room onto the patch of grass outside until a small grin started to spread on his face. He would not be surprised if a bystander later would tell him that he had been skipping the last few steps towards the giant oak tree in the middle of the yard, nor would he care. 

As he sat down against the trunk of the tree he pulled his phone out of his pocket. When he unlocked it, it lead him directly to the new contact Somi had saved just minutes earlier and Daehwi _wanted_ to be annoyed at the cheesy emojis she had put around Woojin’s name, but all he could bring himself to was a quiet chuckle. 

He still was not quite over the fact that she had left him to die earlier, making up an obvious lie so he would have to talk to Woojin alone, but he knew that she would say in the long run he would thank her and maybe, possibly, she was right. After all, no matter what turn this whole thing would take, it would at least move in some kind of direction thanks to her schemes. Three sides of Daehwi battled for their place at the front of his thoughts in this moment. 

The first, the weak, realistic one, told him to hold his horses and to remember what he had thought about just a few minutes ago. This did not mean anything. 

The second, even weaker ,pessimistic part of him, reminded him of the thoughts he had had last week when they were all hanging out at Guanlin’s place. He still did not know Woojin, his feelings could still be misplaced. 

The loudest part and by far Daehwi’s favourite, was the optimistic one, currently on cloud nine and smiling stupidly at his phone screen. This was an opportunity and things were finally happening. 

These black, grey and rosy pink thoughts were still swirling around in his mind when someone sat down next to him. Daehwi was not aware of the other boy’s presence until he spoke up. 

“Hey” 

Looking up (and jumping only slightly), he saw Samuel smiling at him. 

The two of them shared a few classes and a passion for music which they had discovered during a project for music class last year and had bonded over. Samuel was his friend, but not the sort of friend Daehwi wanted to annoy with the confusing chaos of colours in his mind right now, so he locked his phone and returned Samuel’s smile. 

“What’s up?” 

“Uh, Euiwoong told me about that Senior looking for you and Somi for the Bonfire?” 

Daehwi nodded in confirmation for Samuel to go on. 

“I just wanted to say, if you need help with anything I’d be glad to do that. Help you. If you want to.” 

Daehwi’s smile widened and he was already nodding before he answered. Working on the music project with Samuel last year had been fun and he was sure the other could be a great help for this. 

“I’d appreciate it. I don’t know the Senior class president well, but it seems like he wants this to be as perfect as humanly possible” ,he laughed. 

Samuel nodded like he knew exactly what he was talking about, even though Daehwi was pretty sure he did not know Jihoon personally either. “Perfect is what I do.” he gave back.  
“I have to hurry to class now, I just saw you and wanted to offer. Hit me up with more infos when you need help.” 

He teasingly winked at Daehwi when he got up and rushed back into the building a second later, leaving Daehwi to silently smile at himself. Samuel was a good dude, he was sure they would have lots of fun working on this together, especially now that Somi bailed on him. 

Actually, Daehwi was very sure Somi and Samuel would have lots of fun together too. He was convinced all of his friends would like Samuel a lot, and thinking about it he did not quite understand how he wasn’t part of their little group yet.  
They weren’t as exclusive as they sometimes made themselves out to be. Sure, Somi and Daehwi had been friends since they could remember and Jinyoung had joined them during elementary school already, but Guanlin had only been around since the beginning of the school year and they had become close to him in no time. Jinyoung first, more or less voluntarily, since he had been the only one on their biology class willing to help the Taiwanese transfer student catch up with class material. Somi and Daehwi had quickly grown soft on Jinyoung’s new side-kick and soon enough the Lai family’s giant living room had become their most frequented hangout-place. 

They were a tight-knit bunch and Samuel would fit right in. Maybe Daehwi would just start dragging him along to hang out with everyone until nobody questioned it anymore. That’s how Guanlin had gotten to them after all. 

Daehwi picked his phone back up and plucked in his headphones. 

Back when it had been still only him and Somi, his mom would sometimes let them pick out music from her huge collection and would watch as the two of them had danced and performed through the living room. Something they regularly had liked to do was a duet version of the entirety of Les Miserábles -Little 10 year olds, Valjean and Javert, chasing each other through the entire house with plastic swords- and he always had to smile when listening to the songs now. Later, they had tried to make Jinyoung join them, but he never really shared their passion for musical theatre and eventually Somi and Daehwi too had decided that they were too old for their sacred tradition. (Which did not keep them from attempting yet another failed duet rendition of One Day More regularly, to Jinyoung’s chagrin. “It won’t ever sound good guys.You’re missing about 16 people.”) 

The dramatic orchestras of Broadway coming from Daehwi's headphones made way for the soft notes of an acoustic guitar. With Jinyoung an addition to their friendship, Somi and Daehwi had found that it didn’t always have to be loud and busy for them to feel comfortable. It was just as nice to sometimes just sit down, listen to acoustic covers of songs, and talk. Everyone, probably including Jinyoung himself, was surprised at just how much the boy could talk if you let him. The song Daehwi was listening to at that moment was quite possibly the one that had been playing back when they were in the 8th grade and Somi was just done patching up Daehwi’s cut lip after a 9th grader had decided his face would look better with a cut than the “fag attitude” Daehwi was usually carrying. Jinyoung had sat beside him on his bed, tracing calming patterns on Daehwi’s arm and telling him stories from his mothers’ college time. It was a series of lighthearted anecdotes that Daehwi knew were only one side of the coin, but he appreciated them nevertheless. He knew Jinyoung’s moms and he knew that if he could have a marriage just half as happy as theirs at some point, the cut on his lip in middle school wouldn’t mean much anymore. And he was right, already now, a few years later, the whole incident was just that, a faint memory that he had replaced with better ones, ones that didn’t hurt. The memories now included Mrs. Bae’s rainbow frosted cupcakes and her wife trying to teach Jinyoung and Daehwi to play the guitar just like in the song he was listening to now. 

A few months back, Guanlin had complained about Jinyoung’s music choice during a study session at Somi’s place. It was at a point in their friendship where Somi and Daehwi had just accepted Guanlin’s constant presence when they hung out, just assuming they would be four of them when talking about their weekend plans. It never bothered either of them, Guanlin was good company and the way he had latched himself onto Jinyoung in the short time he had known them was nothing short of endearing. However, influencing music choices was different, influencing music choices was a big step. Once someone had influenced their joint Spotify playlist, they became an immovable constant in their life and it wasn’t that the three of them didn’t want Guanlin to be, quite the opposite actually. They were just not sure if Guanlin himself wanted to be. The poor boy had just moved countries, he deserved a chance to have normal highschool friends not the cult of weirdos they were. 

At least that’s what Daehwi had been thinking back then, he only assumed that thanks to some mystical friendship telepathy link that had developed over the years Jinyoung and Somi had been thinking the same. None of them thought to alarm Guanlin of this though, and thus it had happened that Guanlin had put on his choice of study music (Green Day).  
And as Guanlin became a constant of their life, Basket Case became a constant on Daehwi’s playlist. 

He liked it there. 

____________________ 

 

As soon as the last bell of the day rang, dread settled around Daehwi. It came in the form of Somi and Guanlin sidling up to him and grabbing both of his arms, making a quick escape impossible. 

“You’re gonna text him today, right?”, Guanlin asked, and Somi answered in Daehwi’s stead: “Of course he is.” 

“Give him some air, guys.” Jinyoung called from somewhere behind them. Daehwi would have turned around to look at him, but the demons on his shoulders didn’t let him. Jinyoung caught up to them quite soon though, and as soon as Guanlin and Somi had slightly loosened their deathgrip on Daehwi’s arms, he raised an infamous eyebrow. “You _will_ text him, right?” 

Daehwi decided he would never wait for Jinyoung after any class ever again. 

“I don’t know yet”, he shrugged, aiming for a nonchalant gesture but it probably didn’t get his point across as much as he liked to, since he still had two of his friends attached to his hands. 

The point of how little he pretended to care about his whole ordeal apparently didn’t make it through to Somi at all, because she started tugging at his left arm vehemently. “Daehwi you have to, you can’t just _not_ , this is a good thing okay, you can just-” 

Jinyoung interrupted her: “You have to do it as soon as possible anyways. I don’t think Park Jihoon likes to wait for his minions, you’re risking your own _and_ Woojin’s life here.” 

Damn the boy and his logic. 

“You…might have a point.” 

“Good to hear we’re on the same page here. I expect a full report on everything by tomorrow morning.” Jinyoung smiled and hurried away to catch the bus home after flashing them a peace sign. 

“For how annoyed he always pretends to be with all this he’s oddly invested” ,Daehwi grumbled. He finally managed to free his hands when they reached his locker and turned to face his friends again after he was done shoving his books into it. 

“We’re all invested in it!” Guanlin mused with an innocent smile. Daehwi gave back a pained one of his own. 

“I’m aware, Guanlin. I’m very aware.” 

“Don’t pretend like this isn’t your fault. For the fact that you don’t want us talking about your big gay crush you sure talk about it with us a lot.” Somi copied his tone perfectly and the on-point imitation only emphasised how right she was. 

Daehwi loved talking about his feelings. For one because he loved having his feelings validated in any situation, but also because while talking he was able to sort them out best. Daehwi tended to have a lot of thoughts and feelings and just ranting about them to his friends proved to be the easiest way to at least get some kind of grip on them. 

Daehwi sighed. The others could be as annoying as they wanted to about this, he knew exactly that he would tell them every single detail about this situation that was not really one, immediately after it happened. 

“What am I even supposed to say?” he quietly said, more to the backpack he was zipping shut than to the other two. They, of course, didn’t miss him giving in and returned to being demons attached to his arms as soon as he stood upright again. 

“Well obviously you shouldn't start out with _Hi, it’s Daehwi, how about we get married asap?_.” Somi started. 

“Even though that could be a fun conversation opener!” Guanlin threw in. 

“True, but the potential of awkwardness is too high we can take calculated risks only here.” 

“ _I_ can take calculated risks only…” , Daehwi tried to object, but there was no real force behind it. Somi and Guanlin either chose to ignore it or really didn’t hear him. 

“You’re texting him about the Bonfire Night thing and you never talked before today, so your safest bet is probably to just start out with _Hi, it’s Daehwi, we talked earlier…_.” 

“ _You did sadly not ask for my hand in marriage but I guess a meet-up to discuss Jihoon’s thing is a first step in the right direction._ ” ,Guanlin continued. “Did you realize how i said ‘meet-up’ instead of ‘date’?” , he added, sounding immensely proud of that fact.

“Yes, that was very professional of you” , Daehwi replied. The sarcasm was evident in his tone, but again, Guanlin chose to ignore it. 

“It’s actually not that big of a deal” ,Somi threw in, as if she had only just realized that. “The real big issue here is the actual _meet-up_.” 

Guanlin gasped softly at this revelation and the two of them started discussing every worst and best case scenario for every alternate universe that they could think of while dragging Daehwi along in between them. He sighed, again, and resigned to his fate. 

_________________ 

_To: Woojin_

hi! it’s daehwi, we talked earlier??  
i think it will probably be easiest if we meet up at some point to talk about what i actually have to do !! :^)  
whatever works for you! :^)) 

__________________ 

The Google Maps route Woojin had sent him on the day of their meet-up (Guanlin did not allow any other word being used here) lead Daehwi to a small café close to school that he didn’t think he’d ever been to.  
The door and window sills were painted in a soft shade of green, and the sign in the front advertising some ice cream special that sounded sickeningly sweet, featured little drawings in a matching green. All in all the place appealed greatly to Daehwi’s aesthetic and was not what he would’ve thought Woojin’s hang out place of choice to be. 

When he entered he was greeted by not only a very homely smell of coffee, but also two familiar faces. One was Woojin, which he had expected, of course, they were supposed to meet up after all.  
The other one was less expected but not surprising. Hyungseob was wearing an apron in the same shade of green that just seemed to be the shop’s concept, and Daehwi could just imagine the older hurrying around the room carrying orders and charming customers. Hyungseob looked like he belonged in this café, if it had been him to suggest this place to Daehwi for a meet-up, he would not have been remotely surprised. (He would have been very surprised actually but not because of the choice of location. He barely ever talked to Hyungseob and had never spent any him with him alone, without Euiwoong there as some kind of social link.)

The all too fitting presence of the theatre club captain could have made for an overall harmonic picture, had he not been busy trying to smear a spoon of chocolate ice cream on Woojin’s nose at this very moment.  
Daehwi registered this as something noteworthy for two reasons: On one hand he hadn’t known that Hyungseob and Woojin were friends. Many Hollywood movies with a highschool setting had told him that the quarterback and the main vocal of the school choir, the basketball star and the arts club founder, the soccer and theatre club captains reigned in entirely different circles and social expectations did not allow them to be close. Getting down to it, Daehwi was aware that that was not real life and he was also aware that people weren’t one dimensional hollywood tropes, but a small part of him had simply watched too many cliche movies, and some of the narrative had ingrained itself into his thoughts.  
The other thing he registered was that Woojin was laughing. It was a sort of subdued choked up giggle, vaguely reminiscent of the hysterical joy of someone who was being playfully chased around. (He was pretty sure they _would_ have been chasing each other around, had the room not been way too small for that. He was kind of glad that it was. Whoever would have had to clean up afterwards would not have been happy.)  
Seeing as Daehwi had held all but one face to face conversation with Woojin that had been all but that, really, he had never heard him laugh. And right at this moment, when he did, he thought it was one of the best sounds he had heard in his life. 

Neither of the two boys had noticed him yet, and Daehwi used that moment of their unawareness to mentally hit his ridiculous rose pink self to senses. This was not the time. He had conversations to hold and plans to make, and, possibly, ice cream to eat, if Hyungseob was open to serving it instead of attacking his customers with it. Daehwi wasn’t sure if that was a sound business practice. Or maybe it was, Daehwi had no idea how to run a business. 

“Daehwi, what are you doing here?” Hyungseob’s voice caught him mid-thought. 

“I have no idea how to run a business”, he replied, because Hyungseob’s voice had caught him mid-thought and because his brain and mouth had never functioned in sync one day of his life. 

“Well, I’m not sure if I can help you with that.” Hyungseob looked genuinely sorry for that fact, then elaborated: “Neither do I. I mean, I just wasted perfectly good ice cream on a customer who never pays, if that tells you anything.” 

“Stop making me sound like an ice cream freeloader”, Woojin chimed into the conversation. 

“You _are_ an ice cream freeloader!” 

“I was gonna pay for this ice cream, but you had to throw it into my face. Now I’m gonna complain to customer service.” 

“Woojin, Zhengting build every single one of the four ikea tables in this room with his own two hands, what makes you think we have customer service. Which café has customer service?!” 

“Starbucks has customer service”, Daehwi pointed out. Hyungseob looked at him in silence for a few seconds, while Woojin flashed Daehwi a thumbs up for the support. 

“You know what, Daehwi?” Hyungseob said. “Just for that comment I’m going to misspell your name horribly on your drink.” 

“You only have porcelain cups, Seob, Zhengting will quite literally kill you if you write on one of those.” 

“How do you feel about some more ice cream, Woojin?” 

“I would like some ice cream!” Daehwi squeezed into the tiny moment of silence before Woojin could think of a comeback.  
“In a bowl though, if possible, not on my face.” 

“You know, the fact that he had to specify that really means you should have a customer service people can complain to.” 

“I’m never giving you any ice cream ever again”, Hyungseob grumbled, before disappearing through a door coloured the same kind of green as everything else in the shop. 

Daehwi smiled softly to himself and then took the few steps over to where Woojin was sitting. He had nearly forgotten that he had come here for a reason, but was reminded of it once again upon seeing the familiar notebook on the table in front of him.  
His brain and mouth still weren’t on speaking terms with each other, which was why, when he slipped into the booth facing Woojin, he said: “This doesn’t look like a place I would have expected you to suggest.” 

It was a stupid statement for multiple reasons. Why would Daehwi have thought about places that would have been fitting for Woojin to suggest in general? They didn’t know each other. The café was a nice looking place, objectively. Daehwi had just indirectly implied Woojin didn’t fit nice looking places which indirectly meant he had implied that he didn’t think Woojin was nice looking. That was far from the truth. So far.

Woojin didn’t seem to mind. 

“It doesn’t, right? Hyungseob forced us to visit him when he started working here two years ago and we kind of just… kept coming back.” 

“ ‘Us’?” 

“Jihoon, Sohye and me”, Woojin specified. “We’re here a lot, I feel like we hold this café alive just with how much ice cream we eat.” 

“I thought you never pay for your ice cream.” 

“That’s just what Hyungseob wants you to think.” Woojin lowered his voice as if he was sharing an important secret with Daehwi. “Don’t tell him I said that, but he’s technically right. I usually make Jihoon pay for the ice cream, when he’s here.” 

Daehwi faked a gasp and answered in a whisper that matched Woojin’s: “So you really are an ice cream free loader!” 

Woojin looked genuinely offended by that accusation, for the second time that day. 

“Not all the time! Sometimes when I’m here with Sohye, she annoys me into paying.” 

Daehwi laughed. 

He was surprised how easy it was to make conversation with Woojin. After the first disastrous conversation that hadn’t really been one, Daehwi had worried that this meeting would be very short and rather awkward. He himself prided himself on being a natural talker, usually, but somehow that character trait hadn’t quite made an appearance when first faced with his long time crush. Woojin on the other hand had seemed, as Somi had so kindly put it, ‘Like he had never talked to another human being in his life.’  
Daehwi couldn’t blame him, other teenagers were terrifying. The only thing that had bugged him in regards to Woojin’s lack of social skills and the disappearance of his own, had been the potential sad outcome of their meet-up. 

But somehow, conversation came easy now that it was just them in the tiny café. Maybe it was the fact that Daehwi had been prepared for this confrontation and maybe it was the fact that Woojin was in a familiar environment, but when Hyungseob interrupted their light banter a bit later by setting down their order, Daehwi was surprised to realize that they did not completely fail at being social human beings. (Their order came with the ice cream Daehwi had ordered, a new serving of it for Woojin despite the ice cream ban Hyungseob had placed on him earlier, and tea that neither of them had ordered, in a cute porcelain cup with a post-it note that featured a ridiculously misspelled version of Daehwi’s name. “That one’s on the house!” ,Hyungseob had grinned, and disappeared back into the kitchen, ignoring it when Woojin pointed out that it kind of defeated the purpose of revenge to gift Daehwi the tea.) 

It felt like Daehwi’s excited fluttery and bright pink thoughts subdued to a deeper, calmer shade of rose and he couldn’t quite place whether that was a good thing or not. 

 

Woojin 

 

Woojin had always sucked at making friends. People were scary, words were complicated and he was quite fine on his own on Friday nights, thank you very much.  
Having Jihoon in his life was the farthest from an active decision possible, since he had not even been born when their parents decided that they would be best friends, no matter what happened. And whether due to that parental determination, or fate, or simply lack of other options, they now _were_ best friends, no matter what happened. Woojin used to think that they wouldn’t have been friends if the decision hadn’t been made for them, they were too polar to gravitate towards each other. Jihoon was like a splash of yellow. He was outgoing and open in new situations, wanted to get to know new things and people where Woojin chose to stay in the background and observe until he got a grasp on the situation. Woojin was a desaturated warm red. Jihoon was quiet when he felt safe, whatever loud noises he surrounded himself with in new company forgotten and unnecessary when it was just the two of them, while Woojin felt safe to be loud and unapologetic in these situations. They had opposite defense mechanisms and comfort zones but somehow they had always managed to find comfort in each other. Jihoon’s sunny yellows and Woojin’s subdued reds mixed in just the right way to create a homely orange. Woojin had learned in physics class at some point that opposite poles in fact did gravitate towards each other. 

All the other people in his life had mostly found their way there over a detour through Jihoon’s life.

Sohye’s aunt lived in the same street as Jihoon did and when Jihoon’s mother had invited both Mrs. Kim and her niece over for tea shortly after Sohye had moved there in kindergarten, she had promptly hogged all the pink crayons. Jihoon, five years old and very territorial over his crayons back then, had promptly complained about it to Woojin in the other room and together they had worked out an evil scheme to get back on the intruder. (Or, as evil a scheme as kindergarteners could work out. Woojin only vaguely remembered it but he thought it had involved holding Sohye’s penguin plushie hostage for half an hour.) They had immediately stopped in their tracks when Sohye had left the living room and rejoined them in Jihoon’s bedroom. In her tiny hands she had held not only Jihoon’s pink crayons but also two hand-drawn and very pink _New Best Friends_ badges, surprisingly detailed for the work of a 5-year-old. Woojin still had the badge taped to his wall now, 13 years later, next to a bunch of photographs of the three of them that had accumulated over the years. 

Hyungseob had become friends with Jihoon and Sohye in middle school while putting on a children friendly version of Romeo and Juliet with other 8th graders (all of them incompetent, according to Hyungseob). Woojin had been forced to sit through nearly all of their practices and give ‘constructive criticisms’ after, which had really just been vague compliments on their acting since Woojin had known next to nothing about Shakespeare when he had been 13. (He knew slightly more about it now, Sohye had forced him to actually read Macbeth for their english class.)  
Apparently vague compliments on his acting had been the way into Hyungseob’s heart because ever since 8th grade Woojin found himself with free tickets to the annual drama club show and cupcakes with soft green frosting on his birthday. Alternatively soft green frosting on his face. Or other people’s faces. Generally a lot of soft green was involved and mixed with the fact that Hyungseob had always been a strong advocate for food fights, it usually made for a fun birthday party. 

Donghyun for a change, had been close to Woojin before Woojin had introduced him to Jihoon. Originally Donghyun had been tutoring Woojin in history but after a few weeks, talking about historical white dudes’ war problems in the middle ages had evolved into talking about Woojin’s existential problems in freshman year. For example the whole business with Sohye and their disastrous shot at dating that they had started over the summer. Woojin back then had not quite understood yet that it had been disastrous, due to a general lack of inexperience in dating, and that’s where Donghyun had come in. Woojin had always felt like the heavy purple curtains of the library room Donghyun and him usually used for studying would swallow and keep everything that was ever said in there. The thought had comforted him, he had let the curtains soak up quite a lot of the worries whirring around in his head back then, and in extension, Donghyun too. Contrary to the purple curtains, Donghyun was a living person, with life experience, one more year of it than Woojin himself had and apparently that one year had made a grave difference. Under his guidance Woojin had gathered the courage to figure out things with Sohye. Things that had been figured out mainly included reasons as to why their relationship had been a disaster, namely Woojin being utterly emotionally constipated and, infinitely more significant in this situation, Sohye being gay.

Sohye hadn’t needed Donghyun’s guidance or anyone else’s to figure that out and Woojin had been quite envious of that fact for reasons that had only become obvious to him in his junior year. That had been when the conversation in the room with the purple curtains had once again ventured from a war between middle aged white men to the war of thoughts in Woojin’s head. Donghyun had known about Woojin’s admiration for Youngmin, the senior that had been the captain of the school’s soccer team back when Woojin had joined in freshman year, and Donghyun had known about Youngmin starting to date Sewoon from his Math class. When he had offhandedly mentioned that development to Woojin during studying he had intended for it to be a light little distraction in between all the dates and places and names of treaties and battles the boy had been supposed to memorise. He hadn’t expected it to be a big enough distraction to make Woojin stop studying entirely. But stopped studying he had and instead of that had started asking Donghyun for as many details as possible. He hadn’t even been particularly interested in the information he had gathered, or rather, he had been too interested in it since with every minor detail Donghyun struggled to remember about someone else’s relationship, Woojin had seemed more and more devastated. 

It had taken a few more ‘study sessions’ for them to get to the core of said devastations. The revelation had felt weird to Woojin at first, but not wrong. Still he preferred to not put a label on it until he felt more comfortable with it all. Only weeks later after he had sat through a seemingly endless rant by Hyungseob about bisexual erasure in mainstream media (“Why can’t they just say she is bisexual?! Why doesn’t she like labels, Woojin? What have labels ever done to her?! Or anyone?! She is bisexual, Woojin!”), had he chosen that very label for himself. Quite abrupt as Hyungseob had complained, after having been interrupted by it mid-rant. 

Donghyun’s presence in Woojin’s life was pleasant for multiple reasons, including but not limited to life changing revelations and improving grades in history. Right now for example, Woojin thought that it would be a pleasure to have Donghyun around instead of Hyungseob. Donghyun would have known that Woojin was trying his best here to maintain a somewhat civil conversation with a potential new friend and would have left him to it. Hyungseob, not gifted with the same knowledge, and not busy with other things, kept throwing in weird comments because that was just who he _was_ and embarrassing fun facts about Woojin’s life, just because he could.  
Woojin made a mental note to make sure it was Donghyun’s shift the next time he took Daehwi or literally anyone else there. 

The fact that he considered bringing Daehwi here again should have been surprising enough to him. They hadn’t talked for long a few days ago in the juniors’ room and Woojin hadn’t quite known what to expect. He had remembered later that Daehwi had been the pianist accompanying the drama club’s rendition of Heathers last year but apart from that information he knew next to nothing about the boy. It was quite a relief to find that conversation between them wasn't as awkward as it could have been at first and it was even more of a relief that Woojin genuinely enjoyed Daehwi’s company as the conversation went on. Daehwi didn’t seem to mind Hyungseob’s exaggerated anecdotes that could have placed Woojin in a very odd light to strangers. Woojin attributed that to the fact that Daehwi’s friends seemed to stand under that very same odd spotlight. 

“...Well long story short, Jinyoung’s arm _was_ broken, Guanlin owed Euiwoong 10$ and Somi still didn’t know where Siyeon’s nailpolish was from.” 

“Wild.” 

“It sure was.” Daehwi was silent for a moment, apparently still in thought about the specific shade of Siyeon’s nail polish a few months ago. Hyungseob chose this very moment to re-appear (not unlike a boomerang, Woojin thought, or maybe herpes) and throw in his two cents.

“Weren’t you guys supposed to be doing something productive?” He side-eyed the notebook next to Woojin’s bowl of ice cream. “That’s Jihoon’s isn’t it?” 

“Why wouldn’t it be mine?” 

“The watermelons are laughing.” 

“Touché.” Woojin clasped a hand onto the ridiculing fruit in question. “But you’re right, we have business to attend to so if you would _please_ leave us to it and do whatever you’re paid to do around here…” 

“Oh. Oh I see how it is.” Hyungseob put on a fake upset face and Woojin could hear Daehwi chuckle quietly behind the hand that was hiding his mouth. He apparently knew what was coming, and was anticipating it way more than Woojin did. Maybe he just hadn’t sit through enough of Hyungseob’s antics to lose that anticipation. 

Hyungseob drew in a deep, dramatic breath and placed a hand on his own chest as if to calm his heart. “I work. Day and night, I work, for us, for you and me and _Timmy_!” He threw the hand on his chest behind him to indicate the presence of his’ and Woojin’s imaginary infant child. The kid’s name would definitely not be Timmy, Woojin would have to discuss that with him at some point.  
“I put _everything_ into this family and this marriage and for what?! For you to go and find someone younger and send me away to attend to _business matters_ with them. I see how it is Park Woojin. See me and Timmy in court!”  
And without another word he turned on his heel and disappeared in the kitchen, hopefully to do his actual job. 

“I guess I’ll be getting the divorce papers in the mail.” Woojin concluded nonchalantly while flipping open the pages of the notebook. 

“I can’t believe I’m a home-wrecker.” ,Daehwi added, his voice a little hoarse from trying to choke back giggles. 

Woojin decided to continue with Hyungseob’s rethoric just for the hell of it this time. 

“I can”, he chirped. “You’re pretty enough.” 

Daehwi coughed a little and then pointed to the notes in between them. “So, business matters.” 

Huh. Woojin had been wondering when the first bound of awkwardness would come around. 

“Yes.” ,he said and turned to the open page that Daehwi had been pointing to. There weren’t actually many guidelines, it was one of the perks of Jihoon’s one notebook per area of concern rule: no unnecessary bullet points to decipher. Woojin realized he had yet to continue talking. 

“So.” He started again. Why was this so hard all of a sudden? 

“Basically” He forced himself to stay on track. For Jihoon.Or something. “There’s not a lot of regulations or anything. There can’t be anything too explicit on the playlist of course, school administration would go nuts. Encouragement to violence is also critical.” 

All of this were simple and self explainatory facts. So far so easy.

“What’s your concept for this year?” Daehwi inquired. 

Leave it to Woojin to forget the most important part of information. 

“Space. Aliens.” ,he quickly explained. 

Daehwi thought for a second. “That’s easy enough.” ,he concluded at last. 

“Is it? I thought about it for a bit and all I could come up with was an infinite loop of the X-Files theme.” 

Daehwi allowed a tiny smile. “I think I can work with that. I’ll make sure to include the X-Files theme.” 

Woojin nodded with a small smile of his own and they fell back into a bound of awkward silence. Woojin wished they would’ve gone back to the easy flow of conversation that they had before. Perhaps Hyungseob could help break the tension in the air but he of course had chosen this very moment to be the one where he left Woojin to his peace and quiet and conversational demise. 

Daehwi released another cough and vaguely grabbed for his backpack on the booth next to him. 

“Was that everything then, or…?” 

Woojin’s head was nodding to quickly before he managed to have his words keep up with it. “Uhm, yeah! If you have any questions or anything you can text me!” 

Daehwi gave a quick nod as well and then promptly left the café without so much as another smile back at Woojin. 

So much for easy conversation. 

Woojin sighed quietly and turned to the rest of his ice cream outwardly, while inwardly turning back on the last few minutes of conversation. Daehwi and him had been getting along great, so surely there had been something specific that had tipped off the awkward air they ended their meeting on. (Or Daehwi had just finally and quite suddenly realized he hated Woojin’s guts. That was also a very possible explanation, or at least the annoying voice in Woojin’s head thought so.) 

Daehwi had been recounting a peculiar story about his friends. Maybe he had been fighting with one of his friends and talking about them got him in a bad mood? But Woojin realized soon enough that Daehwi had still been quite chipper at that point. So it was probably not that. Hyungseob had declared his and Woojin’s divorce. Maybe Daehwi was sensitive about divorces? That was a very real possibility, Woojin himself had been quite sensitive on the subject back when his parents had split up in the 5th grade. But Daehwi had still joked about it at that point, had humoured Hyungseob and Woojin by playing along with it. So it had to be something right after that. 

Woojin scraped the spoon against the bowl accidentally, creating a terrible screeching sound. 

All that had happened afterwards was his answer to Daehwi’s joke. Maybe Daehwi didn’t appreciate being called a home-wrecker. But he had called _himself_ a home-wrecker. 

He let the spoon drop into the bowl with a loud clatter that seemed to echo through the small empty room. 

_’You’re pretty enough.’_ That was all he had said after that. Thinking about it now he concluded that conversation had turned awkward right after that. Which didn’t particularly surprise him, he had been sure that it was his stupid mouth that had ruined this as it ruined everything, he just didn’t quite understand why. 

It wasn’t like the statement itself should have been surprising to Daehwi. It was not a lie nor was it very unusual to say that the boy was pretty, what with his soft features and love-me-gently eyes. He wasn’t stupid he had to know that he was pretty. It definitely hadn’t beenthat piece of information that had thrown him off, so… 

So maybe he just hadn’t been comfortable with Woojin pointing it out. It wasn’t unusual, after all they didn’t live in the perfect rainbow coloured world Woojin would like to live in and that his friend circle sometimes made him believe he was living in. 

Jihoon for example got upset if Woojin didn’t tell him he was hot at least once a day. One time Jihoon had sulked until Woojin had assured him he was only still friends with him for the eye-candy. That had been a weird day. 

But Daehwi was not Jihoon and Daehwi’s friends were not Woojin’s friends and not everyone was chill with casual gay subtext in conversations. 

Woojin let out another sigh, just as Hyungseob decided to grace him with his presence once again. “Aw no, where’d the cute one go? Do I have to deal with your ugly ass alone again now?” 

“Shut up, Seob.” Woojin was too caught up in the threads of overthinking to deal with the other boy’s nonsense. 

“Okay, I’ll stop being mean to you for a minute if you’ll listen to my contribution to your and your boy-toy’s business matters.” 

“Stop calling him that.” Woojin whined quietly, but Hyungseob chose to ignore him. 

“So my pitch is: roller skates.” 

“...Roller skates.” 

Hyungseob nodded with intent eyes. “Roller skates.” 

Woojin looked at him for a few moments, but Hyungseob didn’t seem to deem it necessary to elaborate. Apparently he expected Woojin to exactly understand whatever he was planning to do with roller skates. 

“Why roller skates?” 

Hyungseob released a tiny gasp. “The question is _why not_ rollerskates, Woojin. Why would you question the roller skates?!” 

“I just don’t understand where exactly you’re seeing roller skates in this, Seob.” 

“Well that’s not my problem, you’re the one planning this, I’m just giving quality input.” 

“Actually, Jihoon-” 

“You’re right! Why am I giving this idea of utter importance to a mere lowly minion? I’ll text the man himself!” 

And with that he hurried back through the green door that separated the kitchen from the rest of the café. The thoughts about roller skates didn’t ease up the Daehwi-related knot in Woojin’s head in the slightest.

 

Daehwi

 _to: Jinyoung_  
you wanted updates. 

well, friend. 

the update is: i am so far gone. 

when will i find the sweet embrace of death.

_from: Jinyoung_

i have tea and a very soft blanket? 

 

Daewhi loved Jinyoung and the chocolate and hazelnut tea Jinyoung’s mom made and fuzzy blankets and _Mama Mia!_ but maybe the start of summer was not the best time for tea and fuzzy blankets and maybe Daehwi would enjoy the movie more if he was actually paying attention. So all he really had left to rely on was Jinyoung. 

And Jinyoung was really trying his best here, he had attempted to make an iced version of his mother’s tea, which had tasted disgusting so they dumped it. Then he had attempted to fight the heat from the fuzzy blankets with fans but the fans hadn’t been strong enough so they had dumped the blankets. 

“You know, your important problems are way easier to handle in the winter” ,Jinyoung sighed after he had piled the blankets into a messy pile on the floor in front of his bed. “And you still haven’t actually told me what’s wrong.” 

“Well...nothing is really _wrong_ perse…” 

Jinyoung blinked. “So why did I bring all these fans up here?” 

Daehwi opened his mouth and closed it again, which really should’ve told Jinyoung that maybe something _was_ wrong. Daehwi didn’t do not-finding-words.  
Apparently Jinyoung was aware of this fact, because he sighed again, and resituated himself in the tons of pillows they were sitting on. He was there to stay. 

“So let’s start from the top. You went to see Woojin at the Zhu’s café. You went there right, you didn’t chicken out before that, right?” 

Daehwi nodded, then shook his head, confused himself by the actions and opted instead to quietly say: “I did go there.” 

“Okay. That’s good. I would have silently judged you if you chickened out.” 

Daehwi looked at him. 

“Guanlin and Somi would have judged you out loud”, Jinyoung clarified. 

Daehwi nodded. 

“Okay then. You talked to Woojin?” 

Daehwi nodded again. 

“Was Hyungseob working?” 

Daehwi started to nod once again but then stopped. “How do you know that Hyungseob works there? I didn’t know that before.” 

“Euiwoong must’ve mentioned it at some point.” 

“Right.” 

“Right so you were talking, Hyungseob was there.” 

“We were. He was.” 

“So I’m guessing something that was said is what caused...whatever this is.” 

“... Kind of.” 

Jinyoung blinked. Then sighed. He did a lot of blinking and sighing that day. “You’re not going to make this easy on me, huh?” 

The pillows arranged around them were huge and just as fuzzy as the messy pile of blankets on the floor and Daehwi would like to disappear in between them. Which was physically and practically impossible, so instead he gathered as many of them as possible in his arms and rested his chin in the dark grey fuzz. “There was just...a lot of realizing things.” 

“Okay Kylie. Care to elaborate on that?” 

Now it was on Daehwi to sigh. 

“It’s complicated-” 

“ _Don’t_ ‘it’s complicated’ me.” 

“I was gonna elaborate on my unintentional Kylie-Jenner-tweet-reference.” 

“In that case: ‘It’s complicated’ me all you want.” 

“When we were hanging out at Guanlin’s last week, I kind of realized that I’m a dreamer and a hopeless romantic-” 

“You only realized that now?... Sorry. Continue.” 

“Thank you. So I realized that. And I decided that I needed to stop. I mean, it’s eventually gonna end in a lot of heartache and unnecessarily consumed ice cream and disappointment.” 

“...Because you don’t really know Woojin, which makes him Schrödinger's douchebag?” 

“Yes that was my thought process. Or close to that.” 

“Damn, I didn’t think Guanlin’s nonsense would have that kind of impact on you.” 

“ _Anyways._ I had that resolve.” 

“The resolve to stop?” 

“Precisely. I had it. But then-” 

“Something was said.” 

Daehwi had been clutching the unrealistic amount of pillows in his arms up until this point, out of a mix of nervous energy and need for comfort that only synthetic fuzz could give him. Now he let his arms drop and most of the pillows fell down, which added a nice touch of drama, when he pleaded: “Please stop interrupting me.” 

“Right. Sorry. Not cool. What was said?” 

“He said I was pretty.” 

It was silent for a few moments. Jinyoung was clearly waiting for an elaboration beyond that, staring at Daehwi with his eyebrows raised. Daehwi stayed silent. 

“What, that’s it? What’s the big deal, Daewhi? You _are_ pretty, that’s just a fact. I tell you this all the time.” 

“Yes, but there’s a very significant difference here.” 

Jinyoung lowered his gaze to the scattered pillows, clearly deep in thought. Then he snapped his fingers and looked back up, having apparently found the answer he had been looking for. “He didn’t mean it.” 

“...What.” Daehwi didn’t even make it sound like a question. 

“He didn’t mean it. He lied to you about an indisputable fact. Which I would never do, that’s the difference. I mean, I did lie to you about indisputable facts before, but I mean it every time I call you pretty.” 

Daehwi himself lowered his gaze to the pillows, but in disbelief, rather than search for knowledge. 

“No. The significant difference is that I haven’t been harbouring an excessive teenage crush on _you_ for years.” 

“Oh. Well, yes that’s also an option. I still mean it everytime I say you’re pretty.” 

“I know, Jinyoung. Thank you.” 

“So why did you text me that you want to die?” 

“Because I had literally just gotten a grip! I had literally just told myself: Daehwi, let it go! You don’t know the guy! Focus on other things, this stupid crush is misplaced! And then he goes around calling me pretty and said he can believe he would cheat with me on Hyungseob, indirectly, and my stomach goes around doing somersaults and my heart starts feeling all weird.” 

“Hold the phone, Hyungseob is dating Euiwoong, why would Wooj-” 

“Not the point, Jinyoung.” 

“Right. Right, sorry. So, if I’m reading this correctly you’re upset because you realized that the crush you realized last week was maybe not a crush at all, was in fact a crush?” 

“Basically, yes.” 

“I… do not know how to help you here.” 

“If your mom’s tea can’t help, what can, really?” Daehwi sent a desperate look to the now empty cups of their failed iced-tea mission. 

“I’m sorry”, Jinyoung said. “No, but… this doesn’t really change anything right? Like whether you have a crush or aren’t sure that you have one doesn’t really matter. What will happen, will happen, man.” He thought for a second, like he was making sense of his own words.  
“Which doesn’t mean I’m saying that anything will happen. You know, I think we should take your newfound realism and apply it to this new-but-not-really-new situation. If that makes sense.” 

It did make some kind of sense. Daehwi huffed out his agreement. 

“Do you think you’ll be okay now?” 

Another huff, as he gathered up some of the pillows again. After a few moments of silence, more comfortable now and more what they were used to, Jinyoung chanced another look at Daehwi. 

“Next Saturday... “ 

Daehwi pressed his face into the pillows in case he couldn’t hold back the agonised yell that was building up in his throat. He had forgotten about Saturday. 

When Daehwi’s whole reverie about him and Woojin one day happily married with a white picket fence and a dog had started, he had dragged Jinyoung along to many, _many_ soccer games. At first he had pretended to have a newfound ambition to support the school spirit, but Jinyoung had quickly deducted that Daehwi was just as little interested in this sport he knew nothing about as he had been before. Jinyoung had also not taken long to find out that what piqued Daehwi’s interest instead was infact the boy guarding the goal.  
To Jinyoung he had just been ‘that sophomore who picked up the chemistry book you dropped last week’, but to Daehwi that very action had been, as he had put it, ‘life changing’ and ‘one of the most significant moments of his life’. 

Now, Daehwi would like to go back in time and tell his past self to shut his over-dramatic mouth and get a grip, so the current Daehwi wouldn’t have to deal with the same problem anymore. A lot of his problems would be solved with the power of time-travel actually, for example the fact that over the years, watching a soccer game once in a while had become some sort of tradition for him and Jinyoung. Included in this tradition was usually Jinyoung pretending to hate it, Daehwi miraculously still not understanding anything about the game (Last month he had asked Jinyoung why there was one person on the field who never got the ball. He had been talking about the referee.) and them getting milkshakes afterwards. This was not a problem in itself, the problem here was, that Daehwi had forgotten about the soccer game they agreed to watch this Saturday. When he had agreed to that, he couldn’t have known that he’d have life changing revelations shortly after that. 

“Don’t you dare bail on me and our stupid soccer dates.” Jinyoung warned, reading perfectly in Daehwi’s poorly disguised suffering. 

“It’s gonna be so awkward”, Daehwi whined in response. 

“Nothing’s going to be awkward, we’ll watch the game, the two of you won’t acknowledge each other as per usual, we get ridiculously overpriced and sweet milkshakes afterwards.” 

“I knew you were only in it for the milkshakes.” 

“So what if I am?” 

“Fair. But that’s not the point, Jinyoung. I quite literally fled earlier when he said that. I panicked, it wouldn’t have surprised me if I had ran out.” 

“So?” 

“ _’So?’_ It’s embarrassing, Jinyoung! He probably thinks I’m weird. That’s the main problem here, he knows who I am now!” 

“Never thought I’d live to see the day where you say that Park Woojin knowing who you are is a problem.” 

Daehwi half-heartedly threw a pillow against Jinyoung’s chest. “I’m suffering here.” 

“And I’m offering you a way out of your suffering!” 

Daehwi raised an eyebrow at him. 

“Spending quality time with your best friend and getting an overpriced sugar-shock afterwards.”, Jinyoung clarified. 

Daehwi sighed. A lot of sighing happened that day. 

__________________________ 

Saturday was a friendly and sunny day, which meant quite a lot of people had found the motivation in them to go and support their school's soccer team. Daehwi wondered how many of them knew that the referee never took an active part in the game, while he and Jinyoung settled on the bleachers. 

The bleachers were crowded, as they usually were, and for a change Daehwi was happy for that because for a change he had a reason to hide in the masses. Daehwi said he felt like a ninja of romance. Jinyoung said he was stupid. 

The game itself was pretty uneventful, as far as Daehwi could tell (which was not very far). Goals were being shot, the ball was being kicked, things were being yelled and nobody got majorly hurt, which Daehwi thought could count as uneventful. He thought their team might have won but he was not entirely sure. All he really cared for after the referee ended the game was to leave the school premises as soon as possible and get the overpriced sugar concoction Jinyoung had promised him, but people seemed to have other ideas. 

“Daehwi! Lee Daehwi!” 

Daehwi turned around at the sound of an unfamiliar voice calling his name and tried to find the source of said voice in the masses of students trying to leave through the narrow entryway of the soccer field at the same time. He didn’t actually see Jihoon until the Senior was stood right before him and called his name again, right into his face. “Daehwi!” 

“Jihoon!” ,Daehwi yelled back on instinct. Then he remembered that he had never talked to Jihoon before in his life and that it was weird to just yell the other’s name at him like that. Jihoon didn’t seem to mind though, he had been doing the same after all. He opened his mouth and presumably said something in a normal conversational volume, but normal conversational volumes didn’t work in a situation where the entire student body involuntarily reenacted Braveheart around them. Daehwi shook his head to indicate that he hadn’t heard a word Jihoon said and gestured to the entryway. He hoped Jihoon understood that he meant to suggest they talk more once they weren’t caught up in an army of adolescents and would follow him, grabbed a hold onto Jinyoung’s shirtsleeve and pulled him to freedom. 

Once the masses around them cleared and Daehwi could safely let go of Jinyoung’s shirtsleeve without having to fear to lose him forever, he looked behind him to check if Jihoon survived the endeavour. 

He had, and not unlike Daehwi he had a deathgrip on someone’s arm. The girl didn’t seem as chill with her blood circulation being cut off as Jinyoung had been, she was trying to pry Jihoon’s fingers off her elbow while complaining. Loudly. Daehwi only caught half of it but he was pretty sure she was promising Jihoon to sue him if she so much as found a bruise on her arm. When the two of them reached him and Jinyoung, the girl stopped mid-sentence and broke into a wide smile. “Hi! You must be Daehwi, heard lots about you. I’m Sohye.” 

Vaguely, he remembered Sohye’s name from the drama club practices he had participated in last year when he had fstarted as their pianist. Vaguely, he also remembered her names from a multitude of times Woojin had mentioned it last Wednesday in the café.  
Daehwi managed to return her smile even though he was still kind of caught up on the rather vulgar threats she had just yelled into Jihoon’s face. She seemed to be long over the possible damage on her arm, as she turned to Jinyoung next to him with the same open and friendly expression. “And you are?” 

“Jinyoung”, was his rather quiet reply, and then even quieter: “Hey, Jihoon.” 

Jihoon waved at him with a dazzling grin and when Daehwi turned to his best friend he caught the glimpse of a smile on his face. Huh. 

“So why exactly did you nearly rip out my arm to get here?” Sohye inquired, getting them all back on track. 

“Right, thank you for reminding me.” The smile on Jihoon’s face fell and was replaced with something more professional looking. Daehwi bet Jihoon was an excellent actor.  
“As I have been informed, you’re our man for the music, right?” 

His business-like tone of voice made Daehwi feel like “man for the music” was a title he could be proud of. Whether that was true or not, he would be glad to embrace it. Maybe he should get business cards done. 

When Daehwi nodded, Jihoon continued: “My informant also relayed the necessary information for this task to you?” 

Daehwi held back a chuckle. Possibly, Jihoon was milking the professionalism just slightly. Sohye also seemed to think so. She rolled her eyes, flicked Jihoon’s forehead to get his attention and then pointed to the soccer field’s entryway behind them. “Your informant is gracing us with his presence right at this second. Oh wow, and his body odour, Woojin you’re gross and covered in dirt, don’t talk to me until you showered.” 

Either to humour Sohye or to mock her, Woojin pointedly turned to Jihoon and said: “Jihoon, I came to talk to _you_.” 

“That is so kind of you Woojin but I’m in the middle of something here.” 

Sohye went back on her own resolve to not communicate with Woojin until he had communicated with water and soap and chipped in: “He’s in the middle of not trusting you and making sure you didn’t fuck up the one job you had.” 

That was when Woojin finally became aware of Daehwi’s and Jinyoung’s presence.  
“Oh, you watched the game?”, he asked. “Didn’t peg you for a soccer fan.” 

“Yeah, I’m not.” Daehwi agreed truthfully. A second to late, when he was met with three single eyebrows raised in confusion, he realized that he couldn’t exactly tell Woojin why he was actually here. “Uhm, I mean… I don’t really get the game. I’m only here for... “ He sent a panicked look Jinyoung’s way, but Jinyoung didn’t seem to be aware of his best friends predicament.

“...School spirit.” Daehwi finally ended his sentence, even though he made it sound more like a question than an answer. To his surprise the three expectant faces he was looking at nodded in understanding. 

“I’m only here for publicity reasons” ,Jihoon nodded. 

“As you maybe got from the fact that he used the words ‘publicity reasons’ in this context, Jihoon thinks he’s the centre of this school and the universe and therefore forces me to come with him to these things, like I’m some kind of personal assistant.” Sohye huffed

Woojin rolled his eyes, then added: “As you maybe got from the fact that both of them completely ignored my presence, neither of them are here for me. Gotta love friendship.” 

“Aw, of course we’re here for you” Sohye cooed, reaching over to pinch Woojin’s cheek in a way that looked intentionally violent more than affectionate.

“You did amazing, sweetie” ,Jihoon joined in as enthusiastically, ruffling Woojin’s hair rather roughly. 

“I would prefer if you kept on ignoring my presence”, Woojin whined quietly while prying their hands off his head. Louder, he added: “For your information, Jihoon, I told Daehwi everything you wanted me to tell him, I was very efficient about it. Wasn’t I, Daehwi?” 

Daehwi nodded, but it was Jinyoung who answered. “Yes, I was told it was a very informative meeting, Daehwi now knows a lot of things he didn’t quite know before.” 

Theoretically, Daehwi knew that Jinyoung could not have been vaguer about this jab and that the three seniors in front of them had no idea what he was talking about. Practically, Daehwi felt himself panicking at Jinyoung’s comment and his mouth once again opened before his brain could force it shut. 

“It was. I do. Strictly Bonfire-related things. Music-related things. I mean, that’s not entirely true, I also know now that Hyungseob works at that place and that they sell really good ice cream, I didn’t know that before. So that’s a non Bonfire-related information I gathered but it’s not something Woojin told me, so I’m not sure if it even counts here. I… yeah.” Finally, _finally_ his brain caught up with his words and forced them to a halt. Of course it didn’t think that necessary before he had made a complete idiot of himself. 

Jihoon chuckled. “You’re right, he really is cute.” 

It took Daehwi a few moments to understand what exactly Jihoon had just said and who exactly he had been talking to, which was why his face only grew significantly warmer after Woojin had lightly hit Jihoon’s arm for the comment. 

So, Woojin had been talking about him to Jihoon. Woojin had told Jihoon he was cute. Huh. 

 

Woojin 

“You’re right, he really is cute.” 

The perks of having a best friend were, that you could share close to all your thoughts with them and they wouldn’t judge you for all of them. The downside of having Jihoon as a best friend were that the boy didn’t know the concept of embarrassment or privacy, and Woojin should have learned way sooner which thoughts he could and could not tell Jihoon about. 

The thought that the Junior he had appointed playlist-duty was cute, a strictly objective observation on Woojin’s part, was a prime example for a thought he should have kept for himself. Because now that Jihoon had off-handedly repeated it out of context, it didn’t sound like what Woojin had thought at all, it sounded very subjective, and very much like terrain Woojin didn’t want to breach after his and Daehwi’s last conversation had died the sudden and awkward death it had. 

In theory, Jihoon was supposed to be aware of this. Woojin had given him a full report on what had happened and on the downward spiral his thoughts had taken after Daehwi had left. But out of theory, Jihoon was just stupid. He had thought for a moment, then had told Woojin that ‘looking at the facts’, he didn’t think that Woojin had been a victim of casual homophobia, but simply a victim of his own inability to handle social confrontations. Afterwards he had refused to explain the facts that they were apparently looking at, saying that Woojin should be very well aware of those, and that elaborating would destroy the ‘ultra-cool and wise advice’ he had just given.  
When Woojin had told him that he hadn’t been giving him any adivice, he’d just been insulting him, Jihoon had simply _tsked_. As if Woojin had been the one being unreasonable. 

Right now though, it wasn’t a question of who was being unreasonable. It was more a question of life or death, seeing as Woojin had yet to decide between dying of embarrassment and living on with the knowledge that apparently all conversations between him and Daehwi ever were doomed to die the same awkward death. He wasn’t sure what it said about him that the second option bothered him more than the first. 

While he was caught up in his thoughts about this dilemma, he nearly didn’t catch Jinyoung’s voice. 

“You can’t tell him that too often, if he hears it too much from you he’ll stop appreciating it.” 

“Can’t relate” ,Jihoon grinned. “Woojin, I’m cute right?” 

“Sure, Jihoon.” He hoped he put the right mixture of agony and irony into the words to make it clear to Jihoon that he needed to stop. 

“See, I make him tell me this all the time and I still appreciate it!” 

“I wish you’d stop appreciating it” ,Woojin murmured under his breath. “Or making me do it.” 

“The truth has to be told, Woojin.” 

“Wait ,so can I tell you you’re annoying every day now too?” Sohye chimed in. She laughed at the (faked) crestfallen expression on Jihoon’s face. “I guess not.” 

“Maybe Daehwi would also appreciate it more if Woojin told him he was cute every day.” Jinyoung threw in nonchalantly. 

Jihoon placed an affronted hand on his chest. “Well who’s gonna tell _me_ then? I don’t think Sohye’s up for the job.” 

“She is not.” ,Sohye confirmed. 

“Well, I’m a big believer in speaking the truth as well” Jinyoung mused. It was vague and Woojin doubted for a second that Jihoon would catch the meaning of it, but apparently he sold his best friend too low. 

Jihoon smiled a special small smile and replied: “I think I could work with that.” 

“I can’t believe you just replaced me like that” Woojin said mostly to interrupt any spark of flirting that was being kindled here, at the same time that Daehwi whined: “What, you’re just gonna leave me alone to die?” 

The gist was the same. 

Sohye rolled her eyes. “Did you guys even listen? They’re not leaving you to die, they’re leaving you in each other’s capable hands.” She huffed. “This whole conversation is weird, can we talk about normal things now?” 

Jihoon raised an eyebrow. “When was the last time we talked about normal things?” 

“What even _are_ normal things?” Woojin chimed in wistfully. 

“Bread.” Jinyoung answered instead of Sohye. 

“If you think that, you just haven’t eaten the right bread yet.” Jihoon pointed at him, not quite an accusation. “But points for trying.” 

________________________ 

At some point after Jihoon had ventured into a passionate rant about bread, Woojin had excused himself to go and take a shower. Not because Sohye forced him to, but because he was an independent young man who could very well take care of his own body hygiene, thank you very much. 

When he came back he found his friends and the Juniors still in the same place, not talking about bread anymore. Or maybe they were. Woojin guessed that even if he tried to tune back into the conversation after having left for roughly 20 minutes, he would have a hard time understanding it, so he opted to interrupt it completely once he sidled up to Jihoon again. “I’m starving, can we do something about that?” 

“Jinyoung and me were gonna grab milkshakes at the diner down the street”, Daehwi answered, interrupting himself in whatever he had been saying before. Woojin felt kind of bad about it. “You guys can come with, if you want to?” 

“Milkshakes are the superior form to consume milk.” Jihoon announced, because he was a weird person and couldn’t simply agree to something without stating his own opinion about it. 

“Um, no offence, but have you ever tasted whipped cream?” Daehwi raised an eyebrow. 

“Does whipped cream come in strawberry flavour? I don’t think so.” 

“I’m pretty sure there’s strawberry flavoured whipped cream” ,Jinyoung commented. 

“Nobody cares if there’s strawberry flavoured whipped cream, guys” ,Sohye interrupted them. “Can we please go and get burgers now?” 

Woojin was thankful for the moments when Sohye decided to be the voice of reason. 

The diner was so close to school that it basically counted as some sort of second cafeteria to the students. The difference was that it served actually edible food and the waiters didn’t give you as much of an unwelcoming vibe as whoever was placed on cafeteria duty. 

“Daehwi, Jinyoung! The game has been over for a while now, I was starting to worry!” One of the waiters behind the counter, a tall friendly guy named Daniel, called as soon as they entered. 

“Yeah, we got held up” Jinyoung explained. Then he turned to the seniors and said: “We come here after games usually. You’re basically intruding on a sacred tradition right now, so feel honoured.” 

Then he went on to greet Daniel and the other waiter, Jisung, properly, while Sohye and Jihoon started discussing the menu and just what exactly the Super Mega Special Surprise Burger could entail. 

Woojin turned to Daehwi. 

“So ,you come to games more often?” Jinyoung had implied something along those lines. 

“Uhm… yeah, once in a while.” Daehwi coughed nervously and Woojin was reminded of their last one on one conversation. Briefly, he thought about not taking the risk to make Daehwi uncomfortable again with whatever stupid thing his mouth would inevitably spill, but either out of pure spite or out of trust in Jihoon’s judgement, he made a try at actual conversation anyways. 

“So what do you usually get? I’m not here that often.” 

Daehwi pointed to the menu displayed on the counter. “One of these usually.” 

The section he was pointing at was titled ‘Special Milkshakes’ and held a number of drinks that sounded like unicorns had thrown up in them, and very much like something Woojin imagined Daehwi to enjoy. 

“Okay but what about actual food? A man is starving here, Daehwi.” 

The boy chuckled. “I don’t know, I don’t really like burgers that much…” 

Woojin looked at him in disbelief for a few seconds. “What do you like if you don’t like burgers? Who in the world-” 

“I prefer sushi”, Daehwi interrupted him, a tiny bit defensive, but mostly amused. 

Woojin narrowed his eyes. “Okay, I’m gonna let that pass.” 

“Thank you”, Daehwi laughed, his voice dripping with sarcasm. This was much closer to the light banter their meeting last week had started with, and way more to Woojin’s liking. 

The entire afternoon was way more to Woojin’s liking. Sure, his friends were as insufferable as they always were and nothing special happened besides the third waiter on duty that day, Sungwoon, yelling at him for dipping his fries into Sohye’s milkshake. (“Not only does it spoil a perfectly good milkshake, it’s also the worst combination possible, food wise, and you disgust me.” “Sungwoon” ,Jisung had interrupted him. “Could you please stop insulting paying customers?”) 

When he went home that day he found himself remembering how stressful it had been to first talk to Daehwi and his friends, and couldn’t help but quietly chuckle at his self from last week. It attracted a worried glance from the elderly woman on the bus next to him, so he quickly pretended to be on his phone. The lady, now more annoyed at sitting next to a Millenial than worried about sitting next to a lunatic, turned away and left Woojin to think more about the social catastrophe he was. 

Despite initial difficulties, the Juniors proved to be fun to be around. Again, it had taken him by surprise just how easy it was to simply talk to Daehwi. Where he oftentimes found himself overthinking and stumbling over his words with other acquaintances or strangers, he had no problems of the sort with the younger. Thinking about it now he was even more surprised by it, because ever since their last meeting Woojin had spent quite some time overthinking what had been said then. Now he let the thought pass his mind that possibly, Jihoon had been right all along. Maybe he hadn’t made Daehwi uncomfortable at all and maybe he hadn’t cruelly killed their blossoming possible friendship. Maybe it just had been a simple misunderstanding that he had read too much into, as he read too much into everything that ever happened to him. The fact that, misunderstanding or not, Daehwi had still voluntarily talked to him today, probably meant that whatever happened didn’t matter. It also meant that he had maybe acquired a new friend, if he wouldn’t fuck up big time in the near future and accidentally insult Daehwi’s entire family, or something. (Woojin would not put it past himself.) 

In all his pretending to be on his phone and not talking to himself, he nearly missed his stop. When he did successfully hurry out of the already closing bus doors, only stumbling a little, he could feel the old lady’s judging stare on the back of his head, but in the face of his social success today, not even this small public embarrassment could rain on his parade. 

Jihoon would probably be proud of him, Woojin thought. He was going around not caring what that old lady thought of him, making friends at his own accord… Even though Jihoon would probably deny the second thing and claim that it had been him who had set Woojin on the task to talk to Daehwi in the first place. But deep down, Woojin was sure Jihoon would know better, and be proud. One time, when they were in the 10th grade Jihoon had told him that he sometimes worried about him. It had been a Monday morning and Jihoon had just asked him how he had spent his weekend, after having told him about all the fun and exciting things that Jihoon himself had experienced on a short trip with the school-paper committee. Woojin had simply replied that he hadn’t really done anything. “You weren’t here”, he had shrugged. Jihoon had said that he wanted Woojin to have other friends he could have fun with and Woojin had asked him why, he had fun with Jihoon after all. “But I’m not always there to have fun with you”, Jihoon had explained. “I hang out with other people sometimes.” Woojin had nodded. “I hang out with myself then. That’s fun.” Jihoon hadn’t believed him. He had tried to bring up Woojin’s, apparently, worryingly small circle of friends a few times after that, but Woojin had always changed the subject. 

It wasn’t that he didn’t understand Jihoon’s worry, it was more that Jihoon didn’t understand that he didn’t need to be worried.

Woojin liked to hang out with him, and he liked to hang out with Sohye, and Hyungseob was annoying to hang out with but Woojin liked it nevertheless. And often Woojin didn’t want to hang out with anyone, and he liked that too. It wasn’t like he was a loner, perse. He had lots of people he could call friends if he squinted, most of his teammates, some people from school, but spending time with them outside of practice and class was draining, so he mostly kept them out of his personal business. 

Jihoon, not a strong believer in the sacredness of Woojin’s personal business, didn’t quite understand that concept and probably never would. Woojin had made his peace with that and tried to ignore it, but right now he still thought about how Jihoon would be overjoyed about the possibility of a new addition to Woojin’s circle of friends. If he wasn’t going to fuck this up it was probably due to Jihoon’s voice in his head yelling at him that he needed to sustain relationships because it was “what makes humans social beings” and “don’t destroy my last hope that you’re really human, Woojin, and not an alien or something.” That voice was coaxing him right now to do whatever was in his power to keep Daehwi as a potential friend. 

To silence Jihoon, insufferable in his head nearly as much as out of it, Woojin took out his phone and opened his short message thread with Daehwi. 

 

 _To: Daehwi_

today was fun, we should repeat that! 

 

After a few seconds he remembered that he’s had two whole long-lasting conversations with Daehwi up until now. He was above simple impersonal text-smalltalk, so he added a personal info he has gathered and remembered about the boy. He was a wonderful potential friend, he thought to himself. 

 

 _To: Daehwi_

next time we can get sushi ;) 

 

He pocketed his phone again because he didn’t want to risk tripping over air on his way home and shattering his screen as well as his left hand. (It totally hadn’t happened before.)  
When he arrived in front of his house his father’s old convertible was already in the driveway. Usually Woojin made it home before his father got back from work. 

“I’m home!”, he announced as he closed the door behind him and was met with silence. 

“I brought fries!”, he added. 

“That’s my favourite grandson!” 

He rolled his eyes as he made his way to the living room where he found every member of the household sitting on the couch and immersed in what looked like an intense game of Monopoly. At least it was intense enough to ignore him coming home, but not enough to ignore the promise of fried potato strips, he judged, as his grandmother greeted him by reaching for the paperbag in his hands. 

“I’m your only grandson, Nana”, he addressed her as he handed the bag over. 

“Well if she had called you her favourite grandchild she would have been lying”, his sister piped up and snatched a fry before their grandmother could stop her. 

“Yerim we agreed not to mention that with your brother around”, the old woman chastised her and placed the bag of fries in between them so they both could reach it comfortably. 

Woojin rolled his eyes again, huffed a small chuckle and sat down next to his father. “Are you losing?” 

“They’re conspiring against me!” 

“No, Dad, you’re just really bad at this.” 

He narrowed his eyes at his daughter and then pointedly turned away from his upcoming bankruptcy on the table and to Woojin on the couch. Woojin tried not to laugh at just how wounded he looked at the prospect to lose against his 13 year old daughter and his own mother in a simple boardgame. 

“How’s it going, champ?”, his father asked. 

“Wonderful”, Woojin said, but it was kind of choked up from the laughter he held back. His father narrowed his eyes again, at him this time, until Woojin took a deep breath and said, with a steadier voice: “We won.” 

“I told you that, Dad! Sohye texted me hours ago, when the game was done.” Yerim piped up. “Also you owe me 100 bucks.” 

“What did you do in the hours since the game was done until now?” Now it was his grandmother who narrowed her eyes at him. He knew that she wasn’t asking this out of worry for his whereabouts or because she would find whatever he got up to questionable. She probably was just as surprised as Woojin himself was about his spontaneous social endeavour today. 

“Went out for lunch with some friends”, he replied truthfully, while his grandmother turned to try and throw a fry into Yerim’s mouth. She missed. “How _is_ Hyungseob, I haven’t seen him in ages”, she asked.

Woojin chuckled both at the fact that his grandmother absolutely adored Hyungseob for some reason, and that she immediately assumed Hyungseob as one of the only three options when Woojin talked about his friends. 

“He’s good, but he wasn’t with us actually. It was just Jihoon and Sohye and two Juniors.” 

“Jihoon and Sohye and who now?” On the second attempt the fry landed in Yerim’s hair, but closer to her mouth than before. Yerim gave an enthusiastic thumbs up. 

“Two Juniors, Daehwi and Jinyoung” Woojin explained. “You’re wasting Daehwi’s perfectly good fries right now.” 

Daehwi, along with not being a fan of burgers, was also not a fan of french fries. He had only realized this after he had ordered them and Sungwoon, after complaining about Daehwi not appreciating his high quality french fry skills, had bagged them and forced the group to take them to someone who knew how to value them as the culinary masterpiece they were. Against initial belief, Woojin’s family did not seem to be worthy. 

“I’m not wasting them, I’m using them for the greater good.” His grandmother corrected him, and smiled at him winningly when the third french fry finally landed in Yerim’s mouth. 

For the third time in the few minutes he had been home, Woojin rolled his eyes and got up from the couch. “I’ll be in my room”, he announced. “Have fun stealing more money from Dad.” 

“Gee, thanks for the support”, his father murmured, as Woojin left them to their board games and Daehwi’s fries. 

When he sat down at his desk and unlocked his phone he was greeted by several texts from Jihoon. 

 

 _From: Jihoon_

we should hang out with the juniors more often 

_From: Jihoon_

you know JINYOUNG laughs at my jokes 

_From: Jihoon_

unlike OTHER people 

_From: Jihoon_

also you and daehwi seemed to get along well, are you considering to drop me? 

 

Woojin chuckled and quicky typed back a response.

 

 _To: Jihoon_

you said yourself that you wanted jinyoung to tell you you’re cute now. if he also laughs at your jokes that’s just a bonus for you 

 

His phone alerted him of a reply only seconds later 

 

 _From: Jihoon_

we’re not talking about you being replaced 

_From: Jihoon_

we’re talking about ME 

_From: Jihoon_

don’t you DARE replace me with another cute gay boy woojin 

 

 _To: Jihoon_

daehwi is gay???? 

 

 _From: Jihoon_

duh??? lmao remember when u thought he might be borderline homophobic 

 

 _To: Jihoon_

has he told you??? 

 

Woojin could have sworn he should have caught that, he had been sitting right in between Daehwi and Jihoon at the diner. Maybe it had happened in the short time that he had took a shower in? But how on earth would they have gotten from the subject of Jihoon’s bread preferences to Daehwi’s sexuality? 

 

 _From: Jihoon_

nah but trust me 

_From: Jihoon_

i know these things 

_From: Jihoon_

why do u care so much? 

 

The last message was adorned with a multitude of eye emojis that were completely unnecessary and completely on brand for Jihoon. 

 

 _To: Jihoon_

well i kind thought he might be borderline homophobic 

 

 _From: Jihoon_

touché 

_From: Jihoon_

he’s cute isn’t he? 

 

 _To: Jihoon_

do you want me to say that ur cuter? 

 

 _From: Jihoon_

^_^ 

 

Woojin locked his phone again without humouring Jihoon out of pure spite and went to lay down on his bed. 

So the awkward ending of his and Daehwi’s first conversation really seemed just to be a misunderstanding that had happened. If Jihoon was right, that was. Woojin wasn’t gonna take Jihoon’s word for the truth here, but he had to admit that Jihoon’s gaydar was far more developed than his own. (Jihoon had known about Woojin’s crush on Mr. Collins, their music teacher in kindergarten, before Woojin even knew what a crush was.) 

A small smile stole its way onto Woojin’s face. Maybe Daehwi fit even better into his circle of friends than he had anticipated. 

His phone lighted up with a text message. It wasn’t another annoying try from Jihoon to fish for compliments, but a reply from Daehwi. 

 

 _From : Daehwi_

sounds great!! i know the best sushi places in town! ^^ 

 

Daehwi 

When he got home he could hear his mother rummaging about in the kitchen. Instead of a greeting, she yelled a moment later: “Yellow or blue?” 

“Blue!”, Daehwi yelled back while slipping off his sneakers. When he started making his way to the kitchen he thought that blue was a good colour to describe the day. A good day, where good things happened, and he felt like he had just opened his eyes to a stark blue sky after a refreshing and well deserved rest, even though the whole day was already behind him. Blue was an exceptionally happy colour. The milkshake he had earlier had also been bright blue, and bubblegum flavoured. Woojin had laughed at him. 

“Hey, Honey”, his mother greeted him at last when he walked in. In her hands she had two different picture frames, one blue and one yellow. “Blue is better, yeah?” 

“Blue is wonderful.” Daehwi confirmed as he took a look at the picture inside the frame. It had been taken at his 10th birthday party, Somi and Jinyoung were perched on either side of him on an armchair that looked way too huge in comparison to how small they had been back then. Daehwi’s mother was kneeling on the ground next to them, pointing their attention to the person holding the camera. Daehwi assumed it had been his father who had taken the photo. He nodded. Blue was a good colour, for a good day. 

His mother smiled as she placed the frame on its designated place on the wall, next to countless other frozen memories in colourful frames. Then she turned to Daehwi with another, wider smile. 

“How was your day? Did you tell Jinyoung I said hi?” 

“Mom, I told you before, he just assumes you said hi at this point, I don’t have to tell him every single time.” 

“That’s what you think but he probably just thinks I’m a very unfriendly person now.” 

She acted upset, but was smiling while doing so. “Somi didn’t go to the diner with you right? I was meaning to text her mother later because of that pie-recipe…” 

The two statements weren’t exactly codependent but Daehwi thought better than to point that out, while it didn’t seem to matter to his mother. She went rummaging through a collection of cooking books on the counter while Daehwi answered:

“No, Jinyoung and me went with some Seniors though.” 

She stopped in her tracks and turned to him, a suspicious glint in her eyes. “Oh, did you now?” 

Too late, Daehwi realized he had made a mistake. “Mom, please…” 

“Was your boy there too?” 

“Mom, _please_.” 

“So he was?” 

“I’m not having this conversation with you.” 

“You started this conversation with me. Stay here, I just want to know if-” 

“Nope, too late, I’m going to my room. I can’t hear you anymore. I’m already gone.” 

Daehwi continued drowning out his mother’s complaints until the door to his room closed behind him and he sat down cross-legged on the rug in front of his bed. Taking out his phone he saw it blinking with a text notification, probably Jinyoung with whatever comment he had on the events of the day. 

_From: Jinyoung_

We’re hanging out with the seniors more from now on. 

 

 _To: Jinyoung_

how come? :o 

 

If Jinyoung used proper punctuation in a text that meant that he was very serious about its content. 

 

 _From: Jinyoung_

They’re fun. 

 

Daehwi suspected there was more to it. But he also knew that Jinyoung sucked and conveying his intentions over text conversations, so he would leave if at this and ask for more information on Monday.  
Halfway through a reply telling Jinyoung about the picture his mother had found and put up in the kitchen, his phone notified him of a text from a different chat. 

 

 _From: Woojin_

today was fun, we should repeat that! 

 

Daehwi nearly dropped his phone. Another notification. 

 

 _From: Woojin_

next time we can get sushi ;) 

 

Daehwi locked his phone and gently laid it down on the rug. He then proceeded to lay himself down on the rug as well, the soft texture of it rubbing against his face which did nothing to help the heat that rose to it, for no reason at all. Daehwi didn’t blush. A lot. He hadn’t blushed at all today while talking to Woojin, probably because they had kept the conversation strictly free of mentions of their affair and Woojin’s reasoning for it this time. And now he had to go and destroy Daehwi’s perfect not-blushing score, and he did it with a single emoji. 

Daehwi lived the tough life of a teenager whose emotions were ticked off by simple combinations of punctuation on his phone screen.  
He covered his face with his hands and wondered if his cheeks were as pink as his insides were feeling. They felt right pink and tingly and like they were squealing - no that was an actual sound, it was coming out of Daehwi’s mouth. 

_Get it together_ , he scolded himself and it sounded suspiciously like Jinyoung’s voice. _You need to send a reply_ another voice reminded him, eerily similar to Somi’s. _This basically counts as him asking you out!_ a third voice sing-songed and Daehwi muttered out loud: “Shut up, Guanlin.” 

He ignored his mental Guanlin that loudly told him to proclaim his undying love for Woojin right here and now over text and tried his best to stick to the facts in his reply. 

 

 _To: Woojin_

sounds great!! i know the best sushi places in town! ^^ 

 

He _did_ know some very good sushi placed around here, and what Woojin had said _did_ sound great. (Even though he had found out that everything Woojin said sounded pretty great to him.) 

 

Another blue text bubble popped up on his screen. 

 

 _From: Woojin_

can’t wait :D 

 

Blue was truly a good colour, for good days.


	2. part ii

Woojin 

Time was a weird concept that Woojin had stopped trying to understand years ago. When you wanted it to slow down, hours felt like seconds and when you wanted something to pass as quickly as possible, seconds became millennia and millennia were something Woojin was not built for. He would be a terrible vampire. 

“We’ve been sitting here the whole day and _nothing_ happened.” He let his head drop to to the table. “Why are we doing this again?” 

“We’re doing this because you suck at musical theory and I, your generous prodigy friend, offered to help you with this assignment because you are this close to failing that class. Also we’ve been here for barely an hour and if you call all these notes i just explained to you _nothing_ you can kindly get your ass out of my kitchen.” 

Woojin didn’t dignify Daehwi’s accusations with a verbal reply, just released a high pitched whine that was muffled by the table. 

“What’s you’re problem, exactly?” Daehwi inquired. Woojin could hear that he tried to be sympathetic but he could also hear the poorly disguised annoyance. 

“I would be a terrible vampire”, Woojin mumbled into the table surface. 

It was quiet for a few seconds. 

“Did you just s-” 

“Yes I did.” 

Silence again. “Okay, I’m not gonna question it. Let’s take a break.” 

That finally caused Woojin to lift up his head and give Daehwi a tired smile. “Yay.” 

“I’m really glad my mom isn’t home from work yet, she would be constantly trying to offer us home-made lemonade just because she’s one of _those_ moms. She doesn’t even know how to make lemonade. If my mother ever offers you lemonade, don’t drink it.” 

“First of all, I would love if your mom was here to offer us lemonade, lemonade sounds wonderful and second of all I wouldn’t not drink it because I’m not fucking rude.” 

Daehwi chuckled and got up to look into the fridge. “...Do you want some lemonade?” 

“I just said lemonade sounds wonderful. Do _you_ know how to make it?” 

“Nope.” 

“Are you trying to poison me?” It was a genuine question. Once in a while Woojin liked to reassure himself that none of his friends were planning to murder him. 

Daehwi rolled his eyes and lifted up the beverage in question from the fridge. “It’s from a can.” He threw it in Woojin’s direction, who only barely managed to catch it thanks to his impeccable goalie reflexes, or something. “Hurry up so we can get back to your assignment.” 

Woojin jutted out his bottom lip. “Can you maybe poison me instead?” 

The reply he got was not a toxic beverage, but a venomous look from the younger, which really was reply enough. He ducked his head and directed his attention to the can in his hands instead. Daehwi could be straight up terrifying sometimes. 

At first he had thought Daehwi was just a sweet boy with a cute face who liked to help desperate Seniors in need with their party planning and their homework. He hadn’t been _wrong_ with that assumption, just not entirely accurate.

Daehwi was sweet but could also be really scary if he was pissed, or had an ulterior motive, or both (like last week, when he had apparently tried to convince his math teacher whom he hated to give him a better grade. Woojin hadn’t been there for it, but Guanlin had assured him that it had chilled him to the bone.) He also liked to help people out, he was really determined to create ‘the best space-themed playlist in the history of space-themed playlists’ and Jihoon was delighted with this motivation. But Daehwi, not unlike Jihoon himself, hated people talking into his work that he didn’t deem as useful. (“Woojin, you literally told me the first time we talked about it that all you could think of for this playlist was the X-files intro, I don’t think I want to hear your suggestions.”) Instead, he had started working on the perfect composition of songs about aliens with Kim Samuel, a boy from his year that apparently knew more about outer space music than Woojin. He was only a little hurt.

Only one of his initial hypotheses hadn’t been proven wrong in the slightest. Daehwi did have a very cute face, Woojin couldn’t deny that.

Right now for example he was concentrating on a piece of the lemonade can’s plastic wrapping that had come lose and his tongue was sticking out slightly while he was picking at it and the afternoon sun was filtering through the windows just so, casting a nice glow on his cheeks and his hair. Woojin thought that the blue of the picture frame behind Daehwi and the blue of the sky outside matched the scenery perfectly, it reminded him of a sunny day at the beach or maybe rather the perfect Hollywood version of that. He also thought that it was unfair to the whole rest of humanity that he could see this but they would never, so he decided to take justice into his own hands. 

Justice came in form of his phone that he had quickly slipped out of his jeans pocket. The sound of the fake camera shutter that it made caused Daehwi to look up from the can and raise an eyebrow. “...Why.” 

He didn’t make it sound like a question but Woojin thought he probably was still expecting an answer. 

“You looked pretty”, he said, while checking back on the picture he had just taken. It didn’t come close to reality, but it was still a pretty good shot if he said so himself. “I’m sure Jinyoung will appreciate this.” 

When he looked back up after pocketing his phone again, Daehwi’s eyes weren’t on him anymore, judging him, like he had expected. Instead, Daehwi was suddenly very interested in the plastic wrap malfunction again and suspiciously quiet. 

It’d been weeks since their unfortunate conversation at the Zhu’s café and by now Woojin was nearly convinced that he had just read too much into it back then. But once in a while they still had those weird moments when Woojin would say something and all of a sudden Daehwi got very quiet, wouldn’t meet his eyes, and then changed the subject entirely. Woojin had given up trying to pin-point what exactly caused these breaks in their easy conversation and had accepted them as something that just went over his head, apparently. 

He still tried to fix whatever he had fucked up without realizing every time. 

He took his phone back into his hand and turned the unlocked screen so Daehwi could see it. “See? It’s a good picture. One day you’re going to think ‘Man, I really could use a nice candid picture of me’ and then you’ll be glad this exists.” 

Daehwi eyed the photo for a few seconds and allowed: “The lighting is pretty.” 

Woojin shook his head. “The main focus here is your face.” 

It looked like Daehwi was deep in thought for a moment, before he opened his mouth, presumably to object. Woojin held up a hand. 

“Trust me, the artist knows the main selling points of his work best.” 

“‘Artist’”, Daehwi scoffed, but he had a tiny smile on his face. That was all Woojin wanted. 

“This”, he pointed to his phone screen.”Is art. And I took it. Therefore I’m the artist. You’re the muse. We live in the Paris of the 20s, if I had been sitting a bit more to the left you could’ve seen the Eiffel Tower through the window. We don’t have much but we make do with the little money I make from my works.” He thought for a second. “Wow this is a really gay alternate universe.” 

The look on Daehwi’s face up until then had shifted back into one of amusement, but now his smile fell and his eyebrows raised in a way that looked everything but amused. Woojin backtracked. 

“Which is not a bad thing. At all. It’s a good thing, it’s a very good thing, I _love_ gay alternate universes. It wasn’t an insult or something. Gay is not an insult. That’s stupid. To use it as that. And insult. Gay is a good thing. Yay, gay things.” 

Daehwi’s eyebrows stayed unamused and an uneasy knot started to build in Woojin’s stomach. Sometimes he tended to forget that he was not automatically out to anyone he met and that not anyone he would come out to would automatically be accepting. He was not even out to everyone he knew. He was only really out to five people, featuring his small group of three close friends, Donghyun and his sister and having Yerim know had not been a voluntary decision. It had been a slip up. Like now. 

(Yerim had been working on an assignment for a creative writing class she took, she had to write about the concept of the future and what it meant to her. 

It had been very early in the morning when she had asked Woojin what he thought his future would look like and he had not thought his answer through. 

“I’ll be a professional soccer player and very successful”, he had yawned and Yerim had laughed. “I will be. I’ll pay for that huge house at the beach you said you wanted when you were seven, just you wait.” 

She had still laughed and handed him a glass of orange juice. “And what else? There’s more to the future than just a job.” 

Woojin had shrugged. “I’ll be happily married. There’ll be a dog. Two dogs. Three even, I’ll talk my future husband into it.” 

Yerim had stopped laughing. “Oh, will you?” 

Woojin had nodded. Then he had realized what he had said and turned to his sister, his eyes wide. “I-I mean…” 

But she had just smiled. “Sounds wonderful. I want one of the dogs to be named after me.”) 

Woojin sighed. “Listen…” 

He kind of hoped Daehwi wouldn’t listen and would just laugh and change the subject like he usually did when conversations became awkward, but of course he didn’t. He just kept looking at Woojin with unamused eyebrows and searching eyes that made his cute face look more vulnerable than Woojin would have ever thought it could be. He sighed again. 

“I really, _really_ didn’t mean that as a bad thing. I just sometimes forget that not everyone’s cool with it and that not everyone knows… Uhm. Yeah, I guess I just sometimes slip up when I’m comfortable because- I mean… I make jokes like this around Jihoon all the time and…” 

_Stop rambling._ He scrunched up his face for a second. 

“I’m bisexual.” His voice sounded way too small for his liking, but he presumed that was okay when he had only said those words out loud once before in his life. 

(“Anyways, the media is way too scared to use the word ‘bisexual’ and honestly, I’m sick of it. How is this progressive? Younger bisexual kids will see this and, you know, _they’re_ the ones confused not these actors on the screen and Hollywood is just passing up a great chance here to help-”  
“I’m bisexual” Woojin had blurted and Hyungseob had blinked at him precisely three times. 

“ _Yay._ ” He had said then. “But why the fuck would you interrupt me like that. That was rude, I was in the middle of a really good rant here…”) 

Daehwi did not look like he was gonna say “ _Yay._ ” anytime soon. His eyebrows stayed where they were and so did the knot in Woojin’s stomach. 

_You shouldn’t have said it, you shouldn’t have said it, you shouldn’t have said it, you shouldn’t have-_

“Me too”, Daehwi said and his voice was equally as tiny as Woojin’s had been before. When he caught Woojin’s look briefly, he the one confused now, he quickly added: “I mean, I’m not. I’m gay. B-but-”, he laughed shakily. “Details, right?” 

The knot in his stomach untangled itself and it tickled and he could feel the corners of his mouth lift slightly. “Right”, he agreed. 

Daehwi gave back a smile of his own, then coughed quietly - a nervous habit of his, as Woojin had found out- and reached for the stack of papers that Woojin had discarded on the table earlier. “So. Your assignment.” 

The corners of Woojin’s mouth fell again. He released another groan, but Daehwi just chuckled. 

“This is homophobic”, Woojin whined. Daehwi’s chuckle became an outright laugh. 

“No, you failing music when I could’ve helped it would be homophobic.”

“That doesn’t even make sense.”

“Neither did your thing!”

Something about the air now seemed even lighter than it had before and even his stupid assignment didn’t seem as stupid now. 

Of course it did again, after two more hours of Daehwi trying to explain to him what exactly a third was, ‘musically, Woojin, we’re still talking about music, not fractions.’ Needless to say, when Daehwi’s phone started ringing, Woojin was more than relieved to get a breather. 

“It’s Sam”, Daehwi announced, then pointed between them and the notes. “This is not over.” 

Woojin scrunched up his face in a pout that Daehwi only laughed at before taking the call. 

 

 

Daehwi 

“Hey, what’s up?” 

Daehwi did not regret it to take Samuel up on his offer to help him with the Bonfire. Not only was he a great help, he was also just fun to be around and Daehwi was definitely set on his plan to sneak the other boy into his close group of friends, one way or another. 

He wasn’t quite sure why he referred to it as ‘sneaking him in’ still because there was still nothing opposing that plan- but it sounded cooler. 

“Hey! I was just downtown and I’m _really_ bored and I was wondering if you maybe wanted to hang out? Grab food together or something?” 

“That’s so sweet of you, but I’m kind of in the middle of something right now, I’m so sorry.” Daehwi really was sorry, Samuel had told him last week that he didn’t really like sushi and Daehwi was ready to change that. Tonight could have been the perfect opportunity but alas, he couldn’t be responsible for Woojin failing music of all things. 

Woojin of course, didn’t seem too hung up on that little detail. “You really don’t need to keep doing this, it’s not going anywhere anyways. Go have fun, be free.” He smiled a hopeful smile, one that showed his snaggletooth and deep down made Daehwi want to agree with everything he said, but he remained cold and uncaring on the surface. Take that, Woojin. 

“Oh, what are you doing?” Samuel inquired on the other end of the line. 

“Making sure that Woojin doesn’t fail in one of his classes. In _senior year_.” He pointedly directed the last part in Woojin’s direction, but he just stuck out his tongue at him. 

“Oh, that sounds serious.” 

“It is. I’m still trying to get that fact through his head though.” 

Samuel laughed. “Well, good luck with that then! Maybe next time?” 

“Definitely.” 

“Make sure to not kill Woojin, the soccer team kind of needs him the rest of the year.” 

“I’ll try not to. I’d imagine it would be pretty hard to kill someone with musical theory.” 

Woojin scoffed. “Oh, you’re doing an excellent job at it, it’s slow and it’s painful.” 

Daehwi rolled his eyes at Woojin, bid Samuel goodbye and was just about to explain to Woojin _again_ that musical theory was not his enemy, when they heard the front door open. 

“Guess who!” his mother called, but didn’t actually wait for a reply. “Dinner! Because I’m an overworked single mother and don’t have time to cook.” 

While she walked into the kitchen to set down the take-out boxes she was carrying, she didn’t stop talking. “That’s not true, I was just being dramatic. Hi, Woojin, sweetie, how are you?” She stopped next to Daehwi and gave him a kiss on the temple, then went to the fridge and ruffled Woojin’s hair affectionately on the way. “You know, I’m self-employed, basically every second I work is voluntary. Can you really get overworked like that? I assume you can but the point is, I’m not, I just like to exaggerate. I theoretically would have had time to cook but I just didn’t want to and I’ve really been craving Thai for a while.” 

While setting down plates she chanced a look to the battlefield of work sheets and notes on her kitchen table. “What have you boys been doing?” 

“Music assignment.” Daehwi answered, and Woojin added, just as chipper: “Your son is torturing me.” 

“Well, music assignment torture is over now!”, she announced and generously pushed papers out of the way to make room for the various boxes. 

“See? Your mom gets it.” 

 

___________________ 

_To: Woojin_

i think my mom likes you better than me :^(

 

 _From: Woojin_

impossible 

 

 _To: Woojin_

i think you’re selling this whole motherly love thing to high 

 

 _From: Woojin_

no i’m just saying it’s impossible to not like you best out of any variety of people 

_From: Woojin_

you’re annoying sometimes and try to kill ppl with musical theory 

_From: Woojin_

but you’re cute and likable and shit 

_From: Woojin_

it’s not about motherly love. it’s sience. 

 

 

 _To: Groupchat_  
_Jinyoung, Guanlin,Somi are online right now._

HE 

 

 _From: Jinyoung_

listen, i know who you’re talking about but we agreed to be less vague. 

 

 _To: Groupchat_

HHEEEE [Sceenshot attached] 

 

 _From: Somi_

awwww he called you annoying :) 

 

_______________________ 

With the end of May approaching, so was the deadline for not only trivial things like last minute assignments but also important things, like the Bonfire playlist. Daehwi assumed that it could have been done in way less time than he and Samuel took, but he also assumed that whatever playlist anyone else would have produced in half the time would also have been only half as good. 

Somehow, between all the essays and research and song compilations, Daehwi still found the time to attend another soccer game held at their campus. Jinyoung had originally thought he would find the time as well, but a last minute text told Daehwi that no, Jinyoung wouldn’t be making it, yes, he was sorry and could Daehwi please tell Jinyoung’s favourite chocolate milkshake he misses it. 

The game was a success. Daehwi only deducted this about 20 minutes after it was done, when Woojin came to meet him outside of the court gates, his hair still wet from the shower, his cheeks rosy and the widest grin on his lips. “It’s such a good day, Daehwi.” 

He couldn’t really stop anything about the smile that was spreading on his own face when he replied: “Well, I’m glad it is.” 

When they made their way to the diner down the street, Daehwi nearly forgot that he had been kind of upset about Jinyoung standing him up initially. At least he could rub it into his face later. _I had a great time, even without you, Ha Ha Ha._

He still would deliver the verbal love letter to Jinyoung’s milkshake though, he wasn’t a terrible friend. 

Sungwoon was busy wiping down some tables in the front of the shop when they entered and raised an eyebrow at the two of them. 

“Where’s your other half?”, he directed at Daehwi. 

“He’s my other half today”, Daehwi pointed at Woojin. “Jinyoung ditched me.” 

Woojin grinned at him some more and suddenly Daehwi realized what he had just said. “I-I mean…” 

Woojin held up a hand. “No take-backs. I’m a wonderful substitute other half, you’ll see.” 

“Alright.” Daehwi gave in but the words came out so tiny, he wasn’t sure that anyone heard them besides the voice in his head that was laughing at him. 

Sungwoon’s eyebrow was still raised. “Oh. Oh, I see how it is.” 

For a moment Daehwi was terrified that Sungwoon would elaborate on how it was and ultimately embarrass him to no end, but Sungwoon just looked between the two of them for another second. “I see.”, he repeated and then left them alone. 

“He could’ve at least taken our orders.” Woojin shrugged as they sat down in one of the booths in the back of the diner. 

“And do his actual job that he is paid for? Sounds fake.” Daehwi laughed. 

He was more than glad that they didn’t talk about what Sungwoon had implied or about ‘other halfs’ in general. Lee Daehwi did not blush in public and Park Woojin had been the exception to this rule too many times already. 

Daniel graced them with his presence a few minutes later. 

“I’m so glad you’re here, business has been slow today and Jisung and Sungwoon have been discussing terrible ideas in the kitchen for hours now.” he announced in lieu of a greeting. 

“Define ‘terrible ideas’.” Daehwi demanded. 

“Well for one Jisung wants to paint the walls out here. There’s so many walls, guys. And who will have to paint all of them? Me.” He thought for a second. “Well technically it's only 4 walls. But they’re big walls! And technically we all would paint them together. But Sungwoon can’t even reach the top!” He looked genuinely worked up about the prospect of painting walls and Daehwi tried to stifle a laugh. 

“What else are they discussing?” 

“Birthday specials.” Daniel said, but his gravely tone of voice made it sound like ‘funerals’ or ‘math exams’. 

Woojin also picked up on that. “If you say it like that it sounds depressing.” 

“Yeah, Daniel, birthdays are a good thing.” 

“For you, maybe. You’re young and can still enjoy them. You don’t have to sing ridiculous songs with bad rhymes when a customer comes in on their birthday.” Daniel’s face was that of dread and Daehwi did his best to not laugh once again but this time he failed. 

“You know”, Woojin said with a grin.”It’s Jihoon’s birthday next week, maybe we’ll come here and you can tell us more about those terrible rhymes.” 

Dread shifted into ice cold anger and Daniel’s eyes shot daggers at the two of them as he quietly said: “Don’t you dare.”  
The intimidating effect was slightly impaired by the fact that Daniel really was anything but intimidating. Also by the fact that he dropped the glare a second later and chirped: “Anyways, what can I get you?” 

When he had taken their order (Two Fairy Drizzle milkshakes, Daehwi had convinced Woojin it wouldn’t kill him, and fries, Woojin didn’t think he could convince Daehwi that they wouldn’t kill him) he left them again, but with a promise to annoy them some more as soon as possible. “I don’t think I want to know what they’re bickering about in the kitchen now, I’ll be out here with you as much as possible.” 

After he disappeared in the kitchen to get their food ready, Daehwi turned to Woojin. 

“Jihoon’s birthday is next week?” 

He got a nod in return. “29th, on Tuesday.” 

“ _Tuesday?_ That’s in three days, why didn’t you tell me earlier?!” 

“I… wasn’t aware you’d like to know?”, it sounded more like a question than an answer. 

“I need to get a present for him! Three days is so little time…” 

“You really don’t need to do that.” 

“No, you don’t understand. Making people amazing presents is my thing, Woojin. I made Somi cry because of her presents three consecutive times now.” 

“That’s adorable and all but it’s really unnecessary. Jihoon isn’t really big on his birthday, we’re just gonna go grab ice cream and watch a movie at his house or something.” Woojin seemed amused by Daehwi’s sudden excitement, but Daehwi just shook his head vehemently. 

“There’s no such thing as not liking birthdays or whatever. Everyone deserves an exciting birthday even if they don’t know they want it.” 

“Please don’t try to plan a big surprise party in three days, he isn’t gonna like it and- it's impossible to do.” 

“I wasn’t going to, I’m not stupid.” Daehwi chipped. “Oh no, my focus for this is on the present. Even though...everything should be more special. We’re gonna make him like this birthday.” 

“‘We’? I did not agree to this.” 

“This is your best friend we’re talking about here.” 

“...I mean. Yes. But-” 

“No buts, we’re doing this. We need balloons. Many balloons. There’s never enough balloons. Also fairylights. And-” 

Daehwi was cut off by Woojin grabbing his hand on the table to get his attention. “Listen Daehwi, this is really sweet of you and you’re a wonderful friend and it’s really cute how excited you get over this but it’s also really, _really_ unnecessary.” 

Daehwi couldn’t really concentrate on what he was going to say anymore because Woojin’s hand was on his and he couldn’t think of anything to reply because Woojin was looking directly at him and it didn’t help that he could feel his cheeks heat up. Daehwi didn’t do not finding words and he didn’t do blushes and Woojin needed to finally understand that and leave him alone. 

“Am I interrupting something here?” 

Daniel seemed to be genuinely asking, but Woojin just laughed and helped the older set down the tray in between them. With Woojin’s hands and full attention no longer on him, Daehwi could finally gather his thoughts and slap the pink chaos in his head to senses. “You’re interrupting me trying to save Jihoon’s birthday.” he told Daniel while he reached for his milkshake. 

“Which doesn’t need saving.” Woojin added and Daehwi pouted at him. 

“Well, I sure hope for everyone involved that this whole saving Jihoon’s birthday business doesn’t end in me having to make a fool out of myself at the workplace.” 

“Yeah, nobody would want that.” Woojin agreed, but his voice dripped with sarcasm and there was a mischievous glint in his eyes when he said it.

Daniel narrowed his eyes at him again. “Watch it, Park. I make your burgers.” 

Woojin just grinned but when he opened his mouth to retort something, he was cut off by Jisung yelling for Daniel from the kitchen. 

“They probably want my opinion on the potential wall colour.” Daniel released a short, high pitched whine. “If I don’t come back, tell my cats I love them.” 

As soon as he was out of ear-shot, Daehwi decided to get back to his point before Woojin could do something equally as irritating as holding his hand again and get him off-track. “Why do you hate birthday-magic?” 

“I don’t” Woojin denied. “I think we just have different definitions of birthday-magic.” 

Again, Daehwi jutted out his bottom lip. “I just want Jihoon to have a nice day.” 

“I know, Daehwi and he will have a nice day. You can be there the whole time and witness how much of a good time he’ll be having.” 

When he saw that Daehwi was still pouting he sighed, but there was a smile on his face. “You’re adorable.” He shook his head and then focused on Daehwi again. 

Daehwi was not gonna blush this time. Not a chance. 

“You said it yourself, this is my best friend we’re talking about. Trust me on this, okay?” 

“Alright.” Daehwi huffed. “At least tell me what you’re giving him for his birthday then.” 

“Scrapbook”, Woojin answered while plopping a fry into his mouth. “It’s cute and shit. Has glitter.” He thought for a moment while chewing. “As does my whole house. It’s everywhere.” He shrugged. “Worth it.” 

Daehwi stared at him for a second. “...Okay, _that’s_ adorable.”, he said finally. 

“Why do you sound so surprised?” Woojin checked over his shoulder that Sungwoon wasn’t anywhere near and dipped the next fry into his milkshake. “Oh wow, this is so sweet.” He slightly furrowed his brows but did the same with the next fry nevertheless. 

“Soon every waiter in this diner is gonna want to murder you. And I’m not surprised, I’m just… I don’t know the scrapbook is just a really sweet idea and very thoughtful.” 

“ _I_ am very thoughtful.” Woojin pointed out and Daehwi chuckled.

“Sure.” 

Woojin briefly stuck out his tongue at him, then focused back on his milkshake and sighed. “I’m not done yet though, there’s still about 20 pages to fill.” 

“...His birthday is in 3 days. 2.5 days.” 

“I’m aware of that.” 

“You have a math quiz on monday, don’t you?”

Woojin scrunched up his face. “Don’t remind me.” 

“I’ll help you.” 

Woojin blinked at him for a second and nearly let his fry drop into the glass. “What?” 

“If you’re not letting me make sure that Jihoon actually has fun on his birthday, let me at least help you get his present done on time. I told you, birthday presents are my area of expertise.” 

“You really don’t have to…” 

“I know, I’m just that nice.” Daehwi snatched one of Woojin’s fries, dipped it in his own milkshake and then took a bite. He scrunched up his face. “Nope, still don’t like fries.” 

“Lee Daehwi, I did not just see you do that!” 

“Sorry, Sungwoon, I regret it and won’t do it again, I promise.” 

 

 

Woojin 

Since apparently Daehwi was set on the thought that Woojin would spend the entirety of Sunday studying for his math quiz, he invited himself over to Woojin’s place after they were done at the diner. Woojin had actually planned to not think about his math quiz until after it was over but he supposed that Daehwi might have a point with his planning. 

His father wasn’t home from work yet when the two of them walked up the driveway, but suspiciously loud noises from the kitchen told Woojin that his grandmother and potentially his sister were there. The noises got ridiculously louder when he unlocked the door and he threw an apologetic look back at Daehwi, who just laughed. 

When they walked into the kitchen they found Woojin’s grandmother and Yerim loudly singing along to a song Woojin had never heard in his life, while just as loudly clattering about with kitchen utensils he didn’t know they owned. Neither of them noticed them walking into the room until he tapped his grandmother on her arm.  
She nearly hit him in the face with a wooden spoon as she whirled around. Yerim doubled over laughing but still managed to turn of the music. 

“Nana, what exactly are you doing?” 

“We’re baking!”, Yerim excitedly replied in their grandmother’s stead. “For Jihoon birthday!”

“That’s nice but why are you so _loud_?” 

“Because everything is more fun with loud music.” His grandmother shrugged. 

“Baking is fun in general, we wanted to make it… _maximum fun_.” Yerim elaborated. 

“So you’re risking pulverising the house and multiple noise complaints from all neighbours?” 

The two of them shrugged and nodded and Woojin sighed. He hadn’t expected anything else. Pointing behind himself at Daehwi in the doorway he said: “This is Daehwi. Daehwi, these are my grandma and my sister, I would love to tell you they’re not usually this weird but they really are.” 

Daehwi lifted his hand to wave but Woojin’s grandmother had none of it and instead went and enveloped him in a hug. “Daehwi! It’s about time we met you, we heard so much about you!” 

“Nana”, Yerim laughed. “That’s about the worst thing you can tell anyone.” 

“It’s fine.” Daehwi smiled. “There’s a lot to hear about me, I do so many interesting things.” 

“That’s the spirit!” Woojin’s grandma said at the same time that Woojin said: “Yes, you do. For example helping me with Jihoon’s present. Which we are doing. Right now. Come on.” He grabbed Daehwi’s arm and pulled him out of the room to the soundtrack of whatever song Yerim had put on now and his grandmother calling after him about manners and cookies and possibly other things that neither of them could hear anymore after Woojin closed his door behind them. 

“Sorry about that”, he said while chucking his bag in a corner. “They’re weird.” 

“You’re weird too and I’m still here.” 

The comment could be an insult, but somehow it made him feel really warm inside.

Woojin grinned at him for a moment, before shuffling over to his desk and picking up a giant photo album. “Here it is, the bane of my existence. Be careful, there’s so much glitter everywhere.” 

While Daehwi went through the different pages, Woojin pointed out some pictures or inside jokes he had scribbled next to them, to explain them. He had been lucky to even find an album big enough to put 19 years of friendship in, he thought, as Daehwi chuckled at a side by side comparison of a picture of Woojin and Jihoon when they were one year old and another one when they were fifteen. 

“You were adorable. Wait, are those Pokémon plushies you’re chewing on in the first picture?” 

Woojin nodded, then got up from the floor and walked over to his bed. After rummaging between the pillows for a while he found what he had been looking for and aimed the very same Charmander plushie he had been holding in the picture 17 years ago at Daehwi’s head. “My grandma got us matching ones for Christmas the year before that. I guess I really appreciated it, having been two months old and all.” 

He settled back onto the floor next to Daehwi and looked at the picture for a second. “Actually”, he added. “She got us matching things for Christmas every year after that too, so these little guys are just the start to a very long sacred tradition or something.” 

The next page showed a picture from the summer before freshman year. Jihoon had taken it himself when he had accompanied Sohye and Woojin to a trip to the mall (peak romance when you were 13), like he had accompanied them to nearly everything else they did. He had been a professional third wheel going into highschool and Woojin assumed that Jihoon constantly being around had been a huge factor to him and Sohye not realizing just how terribly they worked as a couple. 

The picture showed about half of Jihoon’s face in a wide grin and him shooting a thumbs up along one side while the rest of it showed Sohye and Woojin, walking hand in hand behind him. He had been meaning to take ‘cute candids’ of them but still sneaked himself into every single one of them and the outcome was just hilarious. 

“...So, you and Sohye, huh?” Daehwi spoke up. 

“Hm?”, Woojin was too busy mentally high-fiving himself for choosing this hilarious picture of Jihoon for the scrapbook and didn’t immediately understand what Daehwi had asked. Daehwi looked at him then at the picture and back up at him to make his point clear and the coin finally dropped. 

“Oh. No.” Woojin vehemently shook his head and Daehwi chanced another look at the picture, one eyebrow raised. 

“Not anymore.” Woojin elaborated. 

“So you used to…?” 

“We were dating for like a month going into freshman year, but it was terrible.” Woojin laughed. “We were just small and naïve, living in a big heteronormative world.” 

Daehwi nodded, eased smile replacing the knitted eyebrows from before. Woojin nudged his shoulder. “Don’t you think you would have noticed the two of us dating? We’ve been hanging out for weeks now.” 

Before answering, Daehwi looked away and shrugged. “I thought you maybe just weren’t big on PDA or something.” When he did meet Woojin’s eyes and found them crinkled in an amused grin he followed up with a bigger shrug: “I don’t know your life!” 

“Well, know this: I am a strong believer in PDA. You’ll know when I start dating someone.” He thought for a moment. “You’ll probably know regardless.” 

Daehwi coughed. “Why’s that?” 

“We’re friends. Friends tell each other these things, right?” 

Another small cough. “Right.” 

Woojin sent him another grin, then pointed to the glittery book in front of them. “And as for ‘not knowing my life’”- he emphasised Daehwi’s choice of words with air quotes- “We’re getting there. This book holds basically my entire life.” 

Their conversation was interrupted by the tell-tale ding of a text message to Daehwi’s phone. 

“Is that Jinyoung asking if you delivered the cheesy poem to his milkshake?”, Woojin asked, while turning over to the next page in the scrapbook. 

Stopping midway through typing out a reply, Daehwi said: “No, it’s Samuel asking when we’ll finish the playlist. I promised Jihoon I’d have it done by Friday.” 

“I keep standing in the way of you and Sam hanging out.” Woojin observed, recalling the last time Samuel had called while he had been over at Daehwi’s house to study, as well as the following Monday in school when he had taken up Daehwi’s time with the exact same assignment in the free period he and Samuel usually used for productive things. 

“It’s fine”, Daehwi assured. “This is more urgent anyways. And it’s not like you’re forcing me to do it, I’m hanging out with you completely voluntarily, you know?” 

The warm feeling from before returned to Woojin’s chest.

Woojin knew Samuel from soccer practice. He was an enthusiastic kid with amazing talent that had saved the team’s collective ass multiple times before. He was also just really fun to be around and a genuinely good guy, coming close to Daehwi’s own levels of likability, if not quite. Somehow Woojin was really happy that despite Samuel being an overall pleasant presence both personally and on the eyes, Daehwi still emphasised that he voluntarily chose to hang out with Woojin instead. The thought nearly overpowered his slight guilt for keeping the two of them from helping Jihoon and he only felt minimalistically bad about it. His main focus was on the thought itself. It was a warm thought, the kind of thought that set itself comfortably in his stomach instead of tangling it up in knots. It was bright blue and very similar to the shade of blue thoughts about Daehwi seemed to usually have for him. A happy and comfortingly bright colour. 

It matched Daehwi’s smile, when he said: “So, where do you keep all your glitter?” 

 

_________________________ 

 

Jihoon’s birthday was a success, even though Woojin hadn’t managed to make Jihoon genuinely cry with his scrapbook. A crime, as he thought, and Daehwi confirmed. But all it had gotten out of him was some tears from laughing too hard, as well as several death threats for particularly bad shots he had included. 

When they arrived at the café after school, Zhengting had already pushed two of the Ikea tables together to create a large enough sitting space for the vague number of people they had announced to be there- Woojin hadn’t actually been sure if the Juniors would want to tag along but when he dared to imply these doubts, he had earned a disbelieving look from Daehwi, as well as an affectionate hit on the head from Somi.

( “Of course we’re tagging along! Mostly because we love Jihoon, but some of us are also there for the ice cream.” 

“Ice creaaam!”, Guanlin had helpfully provided. Woojin had presumed Jihoon would have been annoyed at him for that but Guanlin had been latching onto the smaller Senior’s neck while he had said it. From the two options given, he seemed to be an ‘all of the above’ kind of person. ) 

“I can’t believe I have to work while all of you are celebrating”, Hyungseob pouted after everyone got settled and Zhengting was done fussing about the birthday boy. 

“Don’t pretend you do any real work around here anyways.” Donghyun mused from the kitchen entrance, which earned him a high-five from Sohye, sitting closest to him and a stuck out tongue from Hyungseob himself. 

“I’m gonna do work right now! Let me take your orders, guys!” 

“For Zhengting to get them ready and me to carry them out by myself?”, Donghyun chimed in again. 

Hyungseob sighed in exasperation. “That’s the point of working in a team, Donghyun.” 

“I know”, the older grinned. “I’m just messing with you.” 

“You know, this is bullying. Bullying at the workplace. I’m gonna file a complaint with Mrs. Zhu an-” 

“I’ll take the strawberry sundae.”, Sohye interrupted Hyungseob’s dramatics very conveniently. Everyone else joined in and Hyungseob seemed to be having trouble keeping up with writing it all down, until they reached the birthday boy himself. 

“Jihoon will have something emotionless and cold.” Daehwi spoke up before Jihoon had the chance to. 

“Is this about me not cryi-” 

“It was a wonderful present packed with nostalgia and memories and love! It deserved tears!” 

Jinyoung sighed. “You know, I would point out how weird it is to be actually mad at him that he didn’t cry. But I know you and that’s just who you are, so…” 

“Yeah, well, I don’t give much about your judgement here anyways, Jinyoung, you’re clearly on his side.” Daehwi turned his (fake, Woojin was kind of sure) glare on Jinyoung for a second. “You gave him flowers. As in, _the_ most boring birthday present besides gift cards.” 

“I liked the flowers.” Jihoon quietly threw in and Jinyoung flashed him a shy smile. 

“Don’t pretend like you wouldn’t like flowers for your birthday, Daehwi.” Somi laughed. 

“I wouldn’t.” 

Woojin couldn’t help but chuckle at Daehwi’s defiant expression: “I’ll buy you flowers for your next birthday, just out of spite.” 

Daehwi’s angry gaze halted on him and now Woojin wasn’t so sure it was fake anymore. 

“Well, I think Daehwi would definitely like flowers from Woojin for his birthday.” Guanlin threw in from the other side of the table with one of his wide grins. 

“That’s gay.” Sohye muttered under her breath. Nobody except Woojin next to her caught it, they went on discussing present preferences while Hyungseob was still desperately waiting for Jihoon’s actual order, but Woojin had definitely heard her. 

He guessed that flowers were a pretty romantic gesture, even though he couldn’t speak from experience. He had never given anyone flowers except for the daisy he had picked for his grandma on her birthday when he had been five and that barely counted.

Of course neither of them would admit to it as of now but Woojin had known that when Jinyoung had given Jihoon his flowers earlier with a small smile and a quiet “Happy Birthday” that seemed to say way more than that, it had been a romantic gesture too.  
Would it be one if he bought flowers for Daehwi? 

He shook his head to himself. That was a ridiculous train of thought. The flowers themselves didn’t mean anything. They were dead plants. The intention made the gesture, so why was Woojin even thinking about it? He had said it himself just now, buying the flowers would be purely out of spite. 

_It would be fun to see Daehwi’s reaction_ , he thought to himself. _That’s the only intention behind it... right?_

As if to reassure himself, he stole a glance at Daehwi. Apparently they had left the discussion behind now and instead, Daehwi was animatedly talking about something. Woojin was too caught up in his thoughts to actually focus on what the younger said, so he paid attention to the way the afternoon sun fell through the lacy blinds of the café and painted a sunny pattern on Daehwi’s cheeks. The pattern matched his face, his excited expressions, the bright and soft tone of his voice, the shine in his eyes. Woojin was reminded of the afternoon in Daehwi’s kitchen when he had felt obliged to take a picture of him looking like this and had told him it was because he looked pretty. 

When his thoughts ventured back to flowers and gestures and intentions he thought that maybe he shouldn’t just give Daehwi flowers out of spite. Maybe he should give him flowers that matched his sunny face like the afternoon light did. Maybe he should tell him it was because he looked pretty. Maybe there was more to it than that. 

The thought felt oddly right in his stomach as it settled there. 

 

 

Daehwi 

He’d had his doubts about Jihoon’s birthday being as much fun as Jihoon deserved, he could admit that. But sitting in the homely atmosphere of the café, just talking and laughing amongst their small group, Daehwi could also admit that he had been wrong.  
He loved being here like this, with his friends, with the Seniors, who hadn’t been his friends for long but felt just as comfortable to be around, with ice cream and entertaining conversations, and looking over at Jihoon he could tell that he loved it too. 

When looking over at Jihoon his gaze also fell at Woojin next to him and he was surprised to find the older boy looking back. Woojin smiled at him and Daehwi matched his expression. 

He loved being here like this. 

About two months ago he had wallowed in self-pity and had needed to give himself a stern reality check. He had attempted to pull himself out of his reveries and had fallen promptly into whatever his reality was now and he had to say, it felt infinitely better than the daydreams he used to have. He knew now that Woojin was not all he had made him out to be, and while it had been precisely what he had been scared about, the things he had learned about Woojin, the real things he had gathered about him as they got closer, felt so much more important. Little habits Daehwi had picked up on, opinions Woojin had shared with him, information Daehwi learned about him pieced together in his mind and melded into the mental image of the boy Daehwi had daydreamed about, completing some parts of him and creating new ones altogether. 

And thinking about it now, Daehwi realized to his own surprise that while nothing had changed regarding his feelings (taking form in his heart rate shooting up whenever Woojin was around still, or doing inconsiderate things like smiling, like right now), so much had changed in general. Woojin was now his friend. Sohye and Jihoon were his friends and they had all become a part of his life as well as of that of his other friends. 

And friendship was a wonderful thing, Daehwi thought as he looked around the small group. All of them were significantly different, had significantly distinct melodies and tones of their own but coming together like this they made a beautiful, if slightly chaotic orchestra that Daehwi would love to listen to every day for the rest of his life. 

And that was what surprised him most about the developments of the last two months. At the start, he had cared about his impression on Woojin, his own opinion on Woojin, his and Woojin’s own little duet so to speak. But now there was so much more he cared about. He cared about whatever it was that made up the beautiful harmony of Jihoon’s rapid beats and Jinyoung’s quiet notes and he cared about how it developed. (He secretly thought the flowers were a wonderful present and he hadn’t been able to hide his proud smile when he had seen Jihoon blush at the gesture earlier.) 

He cared about Hyungseob and Sohye enthusiastically telling Somi about the musical the drama club was planning to put on next year, and about the way Somi’s eyes lit up when Sohye said she would love to see Somi up on stage when she came to visit her first drama club production as a part of the audience rather than the crew. 

He cared about Guanlin excitedly starting to ramble to Woojin about the latest album of a band Daehwi had never heard of in his life except for when he read their name on a shirt Woojin had been wearing. 

What had developed over the last two months was a symphony of trust and comfort and friendship and Daehwi wasn’t scared of finding out things about Woojin anymore. That fear felt like something you look back at from a distance, too small to make out, too far away to be truly important.  
He was scared about something else now. 

He was scared about Woojin finding out things about him. No that wasn’t right. He was excited to get closer to Woojin as he was excited to get close to all of their new friends and the thought of learning more about the boy and him learning more about Daehwi made him a bubbly, yellow kind of giddy. But he was scared of Woojin finding out the reason for this giddiness, scared of Woojin catching a glimpse of the rose coloured thoughts that sometimes clouded Daehwi’s mind when he looked at the older and most of all, scared of what it would mean for them and the little symphony of people they were part of. 

In his imagination, it was like a vibrating bang that halted the symphony entirely or a grating tritone that threw them all off-beat. 

It would be awkward. It would put on hold each and every development happening right now and would cloud over all these things Daehwi found himself caring about now, if Woojin found out about his feelings and didn’t feel the same. 

And Daehwi was so sure that he didn’t.

Woojin had said it himself, they were friends, they told each other things, they helped each other out and you didn’t just come up to your friends one day and say things like ‘Yes, hello, we have built this thing called friendship on trust and comfort and I’m here to tell you that I kept from you for months that I actually don’t wanna be friends with you, I want to be more, Ha Ha.’ 

It would maybe mean the end of everything happening around him right now, Jinyoung blushing at something Jihoon said, Somi’s eyes shining because of a compliment Sohye gave her, Guanlin laughing way too loud at a no doubt lame joke Woojin had just made. Daehwi wouldn’t be responsible for that. 

He tried to ignore the small insignificant aching in his chest in favour of the warmth in his stomach when looking around at his friends. It got harder to push down when his eyes landed back on Woojin but Daehwi would manage. He could do this. 

“What can you do?” Donghyun asked and matched the quiet tone of voice that Daehwi apparently had used when he accidentally, once again, had voiced his thoughts out loud.  
“Everything, if I set my mind to it.” 

“That’s such a good attitude to have”, Donghyun marvelled in appreciation. Then he ruffled his hair and smiled. “I support you.” 

Of course Donghyun had no idea what Daehwi was actually talking about but he still appreciated the vote of confidence that the aching in his heart didn’t give him. 

As if the universe had taken note of his desperation, he felt his phone vibrate with a message that very moment. 

 

 _From: Samuel_

can’t wait for tomorrow!!!!!!!! :D 

 

They had agreed to finish Jihoon’s playlist tomorrow in school. The first thing Daehwi noticed about the message was the seemingly endless string of emojis that followed the statement and in some part of his mind it registered that if his feelings for Woojin could be put into digital form it would look a lot like this. It made him smile that apparently Samuel’s thoughts about Daehwi put into digital form were similar. 

Then Daehwi thought that maybe this was a sign. Maybe he should focus on Samuel’s string of emojis that was right there instead of the hypothetical string of emojis in his mind that the aching in his heart personally typed out. 

 

 _To: Samuel_

me neither ^_^ 

 

“Ohh, who are you texting?”, Hyungseob asked as he set down a glass of soda adorned with a tiny striped umbrella in front of him. 

“A friend” Daehwi answered. 

Hyungseob looked at him with one raised eyebrow. “ _A friend_ , huh?” 

He lowered the eyebrow but only so he could wiggle it along with the other in the most ridiculous way Daehwi had ever witnessed. “Well, I’ll leave you to it.” 

And Daehwi just smiled. He smiled because yes, this was very much a sign. 

 

_________________________ 

“And with this”, Daehwi said slowly while the last song was shown to transfer on his laptop screen. “We’re done.” 

The bar filled up completely and a little green tick in its place told them that the transfer had been a success. Daehwi took the flash drive out of its designated slot with way more grandeur than entirely necessary and resumed to hold it up over both his and Samuel’s had. “The deed has been completed”, he added, as dramatic and important sounding as possible. 

Samuel next to him broke out in a series of excited cheers and claps. It was adorable and made up for the fact that an audience of one couldn’t quite match the importance of the moment that Daehwi had created with his dramatics. 

“And we did it three whole days before the deadline Jihoon gave me!”, Daehwi mused as he put the flash drive in his bag. 

“Yeah! We’re awesome!” 

Daehwi smiled at him. “You know, I think I wouldn't have been able to do this well without you, I’m really glad you helped me.” 

The smile Samuel shot back at him nearly blinded him, it was so bright. “We should celebrate.”, the younger announced, and Daehwi nodded. 

“At the Bonfire.” Samuel continued. Then he briefly looked down at his hands, as if he had said something he didn’t mean to. “That sounded kind of... too direct. I just wanted to suggest going to the Bonfire. Together. Maybe.” 

Daehwi nodded again and this time Samuel seemed genuinely surprised. “That’s a great suggestion.” 

“Oh, really? I mean, yeah! Yeah it is!” Samuel grinned. “You can finally introduce me to all of your friends too, properly. I’d love to meet them.” 

Daehwi had started out his plan to slowly integrate Samuel into his group of friends by telling him fun facts about them here and there, stories he thought he would enjoy and that made them seem very likable. Maybe even more likable than they actually were. The bonfire was definitely a great chance to finalise his schemes, but it was also a great way to finalise something else. He could finally, probably, if everything panned out, act on the very obvious signs the universe and Samuel himself sent him, let Woojin be, and get the grand happy ending scene that he had hoped for all along. 

Right now, mirroring Samuel’s grin, he had to admit that it didn’t quite feel like he was going into the most romantic experience of his high school life. He quite honestly felt more excited about the fact to introduce his friends than he felt about the fact to spend the evening with Samuel. But that was nothing a lot of determination and atmosphere created by good music and pretty lights couldn’t fix. He could do this. He was the master of his own fate. 

The Bonfire would take place one and a half weeks from now and in that time he would manage to finally get his shit together. 

Hopefully. 

 

 

Woojin 

“No, _you_ don’t understand! We need those fairylights, and we needed them like _yesterday_! Do your job!” 

Jihoon yelled into the speaker of his pink flip phone and then dramatically pulled it from his ear and snapped it shut. He turned back to Woojin with a giddy gleam in his eyes and whispered: “I love this phone so fucking much.” 

Woojin chuckled. “When Daehwi told me he was getting it for your birthday I said you probably wouldn’t find much use for it but I think I’ve seen you hang up on people like this five times now. And I’ve only been here for an hour.” 

The gleam was still there when Jihoon nodded. “My mom called me a while ago to say she’d be home later from work and I hung up on her like that.” He sent a loving gaze to the pink device in his hands. “I love this.” 

“I think it’s doing a great job for you dealing with the stress.” Sohye chimed in from her spot perched on Jihoon’s desk. “The Bonfire is in 3 days and you haven’t killed anyone yet.” She reached for a cookie from a box next to her. “Or yourself.” She took a bite. “Oh man, these are so good, can you make Yerim and Nana bake me cookies for my birthday too, Woojin?” 

“Stop killing my birthday cookie stash”, Jihoon pouted. 

“Or what? You can’t dramatically hang up on me, this is a verbal conversation.” 

“I can dramatically throw you out of my room, that has about the same effect.” 

Sohye raised an eyebrow. “Does it, really?” 

It was quiet for a moment, then Jihoon sighed. “No. I don’t think anything comes close to the satisfaction this noise gives me.” 

He let the phone snap shut once for demonstration. 

“Wow. You live such a sad life.” Sohye observed nonchalantly. Suddenly her eyes lit up. “Which reminds me of the reason why we are gathered here today!” 

Now it was on Woojin to raise an eyebrow. “Aren’t we here to help Jihoon with the last Bonfire Night things? I mean, I guess it could count as making his life less sad, but I don’t think that-” 

“No, dummy”, Sohye shook her head. “We’re here for you. To make your life less sad.” 

“We are?” This was new information to Woojin, but Sohye’s face was serious enough for him to assume she was telling the truth. When Jihoon put his beloved flip-phone away, he knew it really had to be. 

“Do I need to be worried, or…?” 

“I don’t know. But _we’re_ worried.”, Jihoon replied. 

In hope for either of them elaborating, Woojin looked between the two of them, but they just looked back with the same serious expression, so he risked to ask: “About me?” 

Jihoon rolled his eyes. “No, about Guanlin, that’s why we’re talking to _you_.” 

“Of course we’re worried about you, idiot.”, Sohye added. 

“First of all, I would be a great person to talk to about Guanlin-related worries, or anyone-related worries, I’m _great_ at dealing with other people’s worries-” 

“You can’t even deal with your own worries.” 

“You wound me, Jihoon. You wound me.” 

“It’s true! That’s the problem here!” Jihoon gestured for Sohye to continue. Sohye folded her hands in her lap and leaned forward, still with the same serious expression on her face. She probably aimed to look professional, but Woojin just was terrified. 

“When was the last time you had a crush, Woojin?”, she asked. 

That was not what Woojin had expected. He had expected something more devastating, something more along the lines of ‘You have 20 more minutes to live’ or ‘You’re a terrible human being and we will never speak to you again’ or ‘Luke Skywalker will die in the next movie’. 

“Uh…” 

Sohye didn’t give him time to think. “Freshman year”, she helpfully supplied. “It was Freshman year and your cute little gay baby crush on Im Youngmin from soccer.” 

“Uh…”, Woojin repeated. “Yeah? I guess?” 

Jihoon nodded. “She’s right. And you know, we started to get a little worried, actually-” 

“What do you mean, you started to? I thought you _are_ worried. I thought that’s the reason for this conversation?” 

Woojin wanted the conversation to end already. He didn’t like the direction this was going in. 

“Not the point.” Jihoon rolled his eyes. “What I’m trying to say here is, you were never really interested in anyone after that. Which is fine, you know, fuck romance. You’re a strong beautiful idiot and don’t need no man. That wasn’t entirely what we thought, because, like I said, we were starting to-” 

Sohye apparently got fed up with Jihoon’s rambling. It was probably the reason why Jihoon had her start to explain in the first place. With a sigh, she cut him off: “You have a crush again.” 

The overall reaction was silence. Woojin was silently alternating between staring at Sohye on the desk and at Jihoon on the bed again, while they were silently staring back at him from both positions, the same serious expressions on their faces as before and their eyebrows raised in an identical demand for a reaction from Woojin. It was petrifying. 

“...What?” 

It was not the reaction them and their raised eyebrows had been hoping for. Simultaneously they deflated in a deep sigh. 

“Woojin…” Sohye seemed to not quite find words to elaborate but her more than desperate tone of voice made up for the lack of content. 

“We know your tells, you know?” Jihoon jumped in. 

“...Tells?”, Woojin repeated. 

“Yes, tells. Things that make it very obvious you like someone.” 

“Like what?” 

“Like ...the fact that you throw around way too many compliments.” Woojin was about to interrupt Jihoon but he seemed to have expected it and lifted one finger. “Yes, I know, ‘too many’ is relative and I always ask for more compliments. The thing is that you compliment people a lot in general because you’re a genuinely nice person and never think about what comes out of your mouth before it does. You just panic afterwards.” 

Leave it to Jihoon to call him a genuinely nice person but still make it sound like he was judging Woojin. 

“That’s ridiculous.” Woojin said. “I don’t-” 

“Yesterday when I was at your house, you complimented your neighbours new hairdo. Your neighbour has been bald ever since he moved in there.”, Sohye pointed out. 

“On Sunday you made sure to tell my dad how much you loved the color scheme the kitchen is painted in. You’ve been sitting in that kitchen basically your whole life.” Jihoon added. 

Woojin shrugged. “I’m a nice person.” He repeated Jihoon’s words from a few minutes ago. 

Sohye shook her head. “You also get way quieter. Jihoon and me carry each and every conversation, all you do is sit and stare into nothingness. Or repeat parts of statements that we made before.” 

“That’s a sound way to participate in a conversation, I read something about that once.” Woojin reasoned, but he only got shaking heads in return again. 

“You forget basic human needs. The other day I asked you what you had for lunch and you said you forgot food was a thing.” 

“I’m a naturally forgetful person!” 

“No, you’re not! You never forget anything, it’s a problem!” 

“I forgot to give you back that DVD last week.”, Woojin pointed out. 

“Yes, you did. That was another tell.” 

Woojin opened his mouth to retort, but Sohye was faster. “And you know what the biggest tell is?” 

She waited for Woojin to raise a questioning eyebrow at her. 

“I said that you like someone a whole 10 minutes ago, and you haven’t denied it yet.” 

Woojin stared at her. Then he blinked. Then he stared at her some more. He didn’t move and neither did her expectantly raised eyebrows. The only things that moved in the room probably were Jihoon’s eyes, looking between his two friends rapidly to not miss the moment when either of them stopped not moving suddenly. 

Woojin was the first to give up. With a sigh, he let himself fall back so he was sprawled out across the floor of Jihoon’s room. As soon as the movement registered with Sohye, she called out: “Ha! I _knew_ it! Hyungseob owes me 10 bucks.” 

Woojin raised his head to glare at her. “You bet about this?!” 

“Woojin. Honey. I know you better than I know myself, if I don’t make bets about what’s going on in your head, what else should I make bets about?” 

Dejectedly he let his head drop back to the floor. The room fell back into silence again, but this time Woojin could quite literally hear Sohye’s grin, and when Jihoon spoke up he also could hear the wiggling of his eyebrows in his voice. “So, Daehwi, huh?” 

Instead of looking up at his friends again, Woojin focussed on one of those glow in the dark stars on the ceiling. “I never said anything about Daehwi.” 

“You didn’t say anything in general, that was all us”, Sohye reminded him, at the same time that Jihoon said: “You didn’t have to.” 

He sighed quietly and his voice was even quieter when he asked: “What gave it away?” Louder, he added after a second: “It definitely wasn’t all that ridiculous stuff that you just listed.” 

“It kind of was.” Sohye huffed, while hopping off of the desk and joining Woojin on the floor. She ruffled his hair shortly and uncharacteristically gently, before laying down next to him on her side, facing him. 

“Also”, Jihoon sounded nearly casual as he also slipped off the bed and onto the floor, “You talked about him a lot in the last time.” 

He laid down on Woojin’s other side and rested his head on Woojin’s shoulder. “Like. _A lot._ ” 

Sohye nodded. “It was pretty adorable.” 

Woojin went to cover his face with his hand that wasn’t currently occupied by Jihoon, but Sohye took it into her own and started tapping a peculiar little beat on the back of it instead. 

“So how are we feeling about this?”, she asked after a few taps. 

“‘We’?” 

“We’re a hive mind.” Jihoon announced from somewhere below Woojin’s chin. “We’re all in love with Daehwi now, even Sohye.” 

Woojin could feel the heat rising into his cheeks. “I never said ‘lo-” 

“Shhh, you’re ruining the cute friendship moment.”, Jihoon interjected. 

“No, _you_ ruined it, when you called us a hive mind and associated heterosexual feelings with me.” Sohye used Woojin’s hand that she was still holding hostage to hit on Jihoon’s head lightly. 

Woojin decided to interrupt. “I don’t know how to feel about it.” He admitted, quietly. 

Sohye was apparently delighted with him speaking up about it on his own because her entire attention was back on him immediately. “That’s okay. You’re new to this.” 

She squeezed his hand. “A whole baby.” 

Woojin scrunched up his face in a cringe at the comment, then reminded her: “When you first forced me to play volleyball with you and I sucked at it, you yelled and me and said my life was a failure.” 

“First of all, that was 4 years ago, I’ve grown into the loving mother I am today in that time. Second of all, that’s different. Volleyball is important and all but it has nothing on love and feelings and shit.” 

Woojin thought that the 4 months of age between him and Sohye definitely didn’t warrant her maternal behaviour. But then he thought that that was just her weird version of comfort. Jihoon wrapped an arm around his middle and cuddled closer, whispering that love and feelings and shit were _so_ important, and Sohye hummed in agreement as she picked the little beat on the back of Woojin’s hand back up again. And Woojin thought that their weird version of comfort was just about perfect. 

______________________ 

Woojin felt weirdly tense as their whole group, Juniors and Seniors alike, gathered around Jihoon shortly before Bonfire Night was starting. Nearly all of it had been Jihoon’s doing, but there was not a trace of the nerves Woojin was feeling on his friend’s face as he ran over a check-list in his favourite notebook (soft pink, dotted, came with cute stickers) for the last time. 

“Drinks and food?” 

“I counted each bottle like three times!”, Guanlin announced proudly. 

“And I told you you really didn’t need to do that, but thank you. Music?” 

“The sacred flash drive is in position and I carry two back-ups. Just in case.” Daehwi put a protective hand over the pocket of his jeans. 

“That’s why you’re my favourite. Fairylights?” 

“After Seonho finally did his job, they’re all set up.” Sohye pointed at a place somewhere behind them. “I think your dramatic flip-phone hanging up really impressed him.” 

“As it should!”, Jihoon grinned widely. Woojin thought that maybe Jihoon had somehow transferred all the jitters he had onto Woojin, possibly by voodoo.

“Okay. One last thing.” Jihoon clapped the notebook shut and put it to the side before continuing. “Group hug?” 

“That’s not on the general check-list, we’re not prepared for that-” Sohye started to say in mock-panic, but she was silenced when she was pulled into the mess of limbs and love and nerves that their friends became with the spontaneous group hug. 

When everyone was disentangled from each other (it took longer than entirely necessary, Somi’s hair had gotten caught in Jinyoung's bracelet), Jihoon clapped once. “We did great guys, everything's going as planned. I have a good feeling about this.” 

“You literally did all of this by yourself.”, Woojin pointed out, not for the first time. 

But Jihoon just shook his head. “We’re a team. We’re the Avengers or something. The Justice League. The Powerpuff Girls.” 

“Definitely the Powerpuff Girls.” Somi repeated. 

Daehwi agreed: “They’re the superior option here.” 

Jihoon beamed. He sent another proud look around his group of friends. “We powerpuffed the shit out of this event.” 

Daehwi and Somi cheered while the rest of them started laughing. Woojin still felt the nerves curl in his stomach but the laughter untangled the threads of anxiety bit by bit. 

_________________ 

“You know what would make this 100% more fun?” 

The Bonfire had been going on for roughly two hours now. Whatever had caused the nervousness Woojin had felt before had calmed down a while ago. Maybe voodoo magic just wore off after a few hours, even when it came from Jihoon. Maybe ‘It’s Raining Men’ was just a very effective anti-anxiety song. 

Right now he was leaning on the makeshift bar they had set up, trying with Yoojung and Chan who were on shift there to find out what exactly was in the Special Fun Punch they served. Jihoon probably knew but he had lost Jihoon precisely 27 minutes ago, so he had been discussing whether an unidentified substance in the punch was a very dead strawberry or an equally as dead gummy bear with Chan, when Hyungseob had sidled up next to him. 

“What would make this 100% more fun?” Woojin humoured him. 

“Gummy bears in the punch?”, Chan hopefully asked, but Hyungseob shook his head again. 

“That’s clearly a strawberry.” He said while sending the dead red thing a scrutinising glance. 

“That’s what I said!” Woojin nodded. He wasn’t quite sure why he was so worked up about it. “Why would there be gummy bears in punch?” 

Chan opened his mouth, probably to repeat whatever ‘pro-gummy bear’ arguments he had repeated over the last five minutes, but was cut off by Yoojung fishing out the thing from the glass it was swimming in and putting it in her mouth. 

“It’s a raspberry.”, she said a second later. “You’re both wrong, now _please_ come help me over here, Chan.” 

As soon as they were left alone, Woojin turned to Hyungseob with raised eyebrows and repeated: “ _What_ would make this 100% more fun?” 

Hyungseob, who had apparently forgotten that he ever asked that question, nodded as he remembered it again and lifted one finger. “Roller skates.” 

“Dude. Seriously, what’s your obsession with roller skates?” 

“I’m not obsessed! I’m just saying, there’s songs that are 100% more fun when you’re wearing roller skates and ‘It’s Raining Men’ is one of them!” 

In the few seconds Woojin looked at Hyungseob, potentially questioning his sanity, potentially questioning his own, potentially just thinking about what the other had said, he himself wasn’t quite sure, the song ended. Bonnie Tyler’s voice filled the air instead and Hyungseob pointed his finger at Woojin: “This is _also_ one of those songs.” 

“Bonnie doesn’t want roller skates, Bonnie wants a hero.” Woojin pointed out but Hyungseob just rolled his eyes at him. Apparently he marked Woojin a lost cause after that because he just snatched a glass of punch he probably never paid for and left. Maybe he was going to find like-minded roller skates supporters. 

Woojin thought that Daehwi would probably like the idea, he seemed like someone who liked the idea of roller skates. Daehwi also liked milkshakes and owned a lot of striped shirts, the skates fit right into the aesthetic. 

0

Woojin wondered if roller skate discos were still a thing. Daehwi would probably love to go to one. Maybe Woojin should find out more about that at some point. Maybe Woojin should take him to one at some point. 

Somehow, when associating it with Daehwi, the idea of wearing shoes with wheels on them didn’t seem as ridiculous as he made it out to be while talking to Hyungseob. 

_Of course it doesn't_ , a resignated voice in his head chimed in. _You don’t have a brand new gay crush on Hyungseob, after all._. 

_Touché_ , he thought. Then he got up to look for some of his friends because he had just talked to himself in his head and that was really not the desirable thing to do at a party. 

He thought he saw Sohye’s bright red shirt at one point but there were people yelling around him and David Bowie was on very loudly and he suddenly remembered why he originally had retreated to the bar when he had given up on finding Jihoon. Crowds were terrible. 

They were especially terrible when they were loud and hyper and you were in the midst of them alone and the voodoo magic your best friend worked on you suddenly made a comeback. Woojin had honestly thought he’d been over feeling _this_ uncomfortable in crowds. He was just about to turn on his heels, return to the corner at the bar he had left and not move until each and every person left the premises, but a hand on his arm stopped him. 

“There you are!”, Daehwi yelled at him over the music and the noise. “We’ve been looking for you!” 

Woojin attempted to explain himself but the music was way too loud for explanations. Daehwi realized as much and motioned for Woojin to follow him. Either because he wasn’t sure Woojin had understood or because he didn’t want to lose track of him among the other students again, he kept his hand around Woojin’s wrist and dragged him through the crowd. With Daehwi there, the masses of people around them seemed way less suffocating already, but Woojin still couldn’t help the deep breath he took once they broke out of the main crowd and reached a group of camping tables, a small distance away from all the chaos. 

“You okay?”, Daehwi inquired carefully. He still had his hand around Woojin’s wrist when he turned around to him. 

“Just not a big fan of crowds.” Woojin admitted and tried for a reassuring smile. He couldn’t see himself but it _felt_ like more of a grimace and he internally cringed when the worried expression on Daehwi’s face didn’t disappear, even when the younger gave him a way more successful smile. 

Daehwi let go of his wrist but only to take a hold of his hand and squeeze it briefly. “Well, there’s no crowds here. It’s just us.” 

He pulled him the last few steps to where most of their friends were sitting and announced: “He’s not dead!” 

“Oh, joyful day!”, Jihoon exclaimed. 

Guanlin shot Woojin a wide smile: “Jihoon just promised me I’d get your record collection if you died.” 

“I’m very glad you didn’t die and can keep your record collection.”, Jihoon emphasised. 

“He said he'd steal all of your clothes, too.” 

“He already does that”, Woojin shrugged, but he smiled. It was a real smile this time and it didn’t leave his face when Daehwi squeezed his hand once more, slipped his fingers from Woojin’s hold and sat down at the table next to Somi. 

Woojin slotted himself in the free space between Daehwi and Jihoon. “Where’s Sohye?” 

“Still looking for you.” Jinyoung explained. 

“Maybe _she_ died.” Woojin couldn’t tell if the expression on Guanlin’s face was horror or excitement. 

“Nah, we’re not getting rid of her that easily, here she is.” Jihoon pointed behind them. 

“Woojin! Where were you!” Sohye didn’t give him time to breathe before continuing: “Hyungseob said you were at the bar, but you weren’t and when I asked Chan he said something about berries and gummy bears and then he had a laughing fit because Mina said ‘gummy berries’ and I’m so confused.” 

With a huff she dropped on the vacant chair next to Jinyoung and made a blind grab for a bag of crisps on the table. “I’m done for today.” 

“It’s not even dark yet.” Jihoon pointed out, which only earned him a glare from the other side of the table. 

“Well not all of us are nocturnal, Jihoon.” 

“But all of us like to have fun, don’t we?” 

“Speak for yourself, you sick vampire Jigglypuff hybrid.” 

Guanlin raised a tentative hand. “If we’re all Powerpuff Girls and Jihoon is a Jigglypuff does that make him a Jiggly-Power-Puff?” 

Sohye stared at him for a second, then turned to Jihoon and Woojin. “Can we disown him?” 

Jihoon put a protecting arm around Guanlin. “He’s doing his _best_ , you monster.” 

They probably went on about Guanlin’s inheritance and Pokémon and vampires after that, but Woojin tuned them out for a while. 

Instead he thought about how nice it was, being here with his friends, in their own little weird bubble while the party was going. It was nice to know that they were enough for each other. It was nice to sit here with the people he cared about while there was a whole bunch of people having fun right next to them, it was nice to hear the music blaring from the speakers and to see the last few rays of sunlight on the grass around them. He thought about how nice it would be when the sun would go down in a while and then he thought about if they would be able to see the sunset from where they were sitting. 

A hand softly tapped against his. 

“What are you thinking about?”, Daehwi asked quietly. The others were still talking about god-knows-what around them, but suddenly they were in their own, even smaller bubble. 

“Do you think we can see the sunset from here?” 

Daehwi looked around and thought for a second, then shook his head. “The sun is behind us. You can see it pretty well from that hill over there though. ” 

Right. Woojin could have known that. “Oh, okay.” 

He nodded in understanding and Daehwi kept looking at him, like there was still something he wanted to ask, or maybe like he was looking for the answer in Woojin’s face. It made the tiny bubble around them bigger, and made him feel like they were farther away from their friends than they actually were. Daehwi’s searching eyes and the soft tone of voice made him feel like it was only the two of them right now, and it made him nervous. But this type of nervous was far more welcome to him than the kind of nervous the crowd gave him before. It was so very similar but at the same time the very opposite. Woojin liked their small bubble. 

“Daehwi! Hi! Hyungseob said you guys would be back here.” 

The bubble burst when Samuel suddenly showed up behind them. 

Daehwi’s eyes left Woojin’s face and the feeling of nervousness left his stomach. It had felt weirdly right there. 

“You made it!” Daehwi smiled at Samuel as he turned to face the other boy. 

“I told you I would be a bit late”, Samuel laughed. 

Daehwi nodded and turned back to the table. “Guys, I’m sure you all know this but that’s Samuel, he helped with this _awesome_ playlist you can hear playing in the background right now.” 

Jihoon shot Samuel a salute while the rest of the table gave a chorus of ‘hello’s but Woojin was too caught up in the little moment they just shared to react. Could it even count as a moment? It sure as hell felt like it should count. Had Daehwi even noticed? 

Whether he had, or not, he sure was over it now. He cheerily babbled along to Samuel about something that had happened before he arrived, asked if he tried the punch yet, said he definitely needed to, then got up, yelled a quick goodbye to the rest of them and pulled Samuel back into the crowd. 

Woojin was still not done processing anything. 

“Earth to Woojin?” Somi waved a hand in front of his eyes. “You there?” 

“You zone out a lot, huh?” Guanlin chuckled. It wasn’t meant as a jab but Woojin still had to force himself to laugh as he caught Jihoon’s meaningful glance. 

“Daehwi and Samuel.” He said awkwardly to change the subject. “They’re close, huh?” 

He realized way too late that he maybe should have chosen a different subject. 

“Oh, yeah”, Jinyoung confirmed with a nod. “They’ve been hanging out a lot because of the playlist. Daehwi talks about him all the time, and honestly, Samuel sounds pretty chill, I hope he stays around.” 

He seemed to have said everything he wanted to say because he nodded to himself and then gave his full attention to the crisps he had at one point snatched from Sohye. 

“I think he will”, Somi assessed, looking thoughtfully in the direction Samuel and Daehwi had disappeared in. 

“How come?” Woojin inquired. He wasn’t sure that he particularly liked where this conversation was going. 

Somi smiled, as if she knew something he didn’t. She probably did. Woojin didn’t know shit. “Samuel has the _biggest_ crush on Daehwi.”, she explained, and Guanlin nodded eagerly, before adding: “Daehwi is just way too oblivious to see it.” 

“Well, he _did_ agree to come here with Samuel.” Jinyoung pointed out. 

Oh. 

“They’re here together?”, Woojin asked again, even though the voice in his head was yelling at him to stop asking stupid questions he didn’t wanna know the answer to. “Like on a-...” 

“Date.” Somi completed his sentence with a nod. “Definitely. I’m just not sure if Daehwi completely understood that.” 

“Oh c’mon, he’s not that dumb.” 

Guanlin and her got into a small argument about Daehwi’s emotional intelligence, but Woojin stopped listening. 

So Daehwi was here. On a date. With Samuel. That was fine. That was absolutely fine. He was definitely 100% cool with that. 

The voice in his head was laughing at him and Woojin wanted to punch it in the face because he _wanted_ to be cool with it. Daehwi seemed to really enjoy Samuel’s company, Woojin knew that for a fact, because Daehwi had told him. He hadn’t thought much about it but he was definitely thinking about it now. 

He didn’t get much time to dwell on it though because Sohye was suddenly next to him, pulling on his arm and announcing that she was hungry and Woojin was going to buy her food. 

Instead of back into the crowd though, she thankfully circled him around it until they were standing behind what Woojin thought might have been the back of the bar. 

“How are we feeling?” 

“I don’t know, you tell me, you’re also part of this hive mind.” Woojin’s remark sounded way less snide than he had wanted it to. 

“Well, the way I see it we just found out our crush is on a date right now, so it would be completely fine to not feel all nice and dandy.” 

“Too bad. Because I do. I do feel very dandy.” 

She raised a scrutinising eyebrow. “Do you?” 

“Absolutely.” 

“It doesn’t bother you at all?” 

“Nope. Why would it?” 

He got only silence. The eyebrow stayed where it was. 

He opted to look at Sohye’s shoes instead of her eyes. Her shoes at least weren’t trying to make him admit to feelings he didn’t want to have. “He’s my friend.” He said, quietly, but not enough for her to not hear him over the noise. “It’s not my place to be bothered by anything.” 

When he dared to look into her face again after a few seconds of silence, he found something way worse than judgement. Sohye had her eyebrows scrunched up and her lips in a small sad smile. She was pitying him. 

It made him feel absolutely ridiculous. He was no child, he didn’t need to be pitied for a small unfortunate crush. 

“I’m fine, okay?”, he snapped. The snide was there now, ten times stronger than he maybe should have used it, but the expression on Sohye’s face riled him up enough to not go back on it and apologize. Instead, he turned and quickly made his way out from behind the bar, not in the direction of where their friends were waiting with more comments on how much fun Daehwi was surely having right now, but right back into the crowd of students dancing. 

Crowds may be terrifying but at least they wouldn’t pity him. 

 

 

Daehwi 

He had miscalculated. Not terribly, but significantly. 

It wasn’t surprising, Daehwi _sucked_ at math, and even if this situation didn’t involve any real math, he still sucked at metaphorical math. And he couldn’t tell where he went wrong with this one. 

Samuel was still just as sweet and cute and fun to be around as he had been in the last few weeks, that much hadn’t changed. And probably that was the problem. _Nothing had changed._

Daehwi had thought that he would come around at one point during the evening. He had thought that the A+ ambience of the venue, the fairylights and good music and blinking stars above them would at some point make him look at Samuel and think: “Yes, I’m on a date with this boy and it’s _great_. 

But instead the sun was going down right now, as Samuel told him a story about his cousin and their dog, and it surely was an interesting story and he _wanted_ to listen, but his thoughts were elsewhere. He watched the last few rays of sunlight paint the premises gold and orange and he remembered how Woojin had asked him about the sunset earlier. He wondered if Woojin could see it now, if he had looked for a place where he could or if he had just stayed with their friends. When Daehwi had told him that he wouldn’t be able to see the sunset from there, he had looked kind of sad. Daehwi had thought it was adorable, the tiny pout on his face had made Daehwi want to promise him to go and watch the sun go down from that hill he had been talking about, and he probably would have done just that, had Samuel not arrived at that moment. And with Samuel, Daehwi remembered his initial plan. 

Spend time with Samuel, _focus_ on Samuel, have fun, don't think about the adorable look on Woojin’s beautiful face, eventually get over Woojin’s beautiful face entirely. 

He thought that Woojin’s face would probably be even more beautiful in the light of the setting sun. 

The point where he had miscalculated was probably somewhere way before he had even finalised this plan. 

“...-On what planet are you right now?”, Samuel laughed. 

“Oh, I’m sorry.” He really, really was. This wasn’t fair to Samuel especially and Daehwi would like to tell him how truly sorry he was but he felt that that would just be very awkward. 

Samuel still had a smile on his face, but something changed about his expression now as he stayed silent for a moment. 

“Daehwi?”, he asked then. 

_Oh god, here we go, you’ll have to painfully let him down and he’s going to hate you and never speak to you again and he’s never gonna stay friends with you and he won’t ever become friends with the others and-_

“Yeah?” 

“We’re friends, right?” 

That was a weird way to start this conversation. But he was sure Samuel knew what he was doing. More than Daehwi himself at least. 

“Of course.”, he nodded, maybe a bit too vehemently, too make sure Samuel saw him in the faint light still left. 

Samuel mirrored his nod, slowly. It was quiet for another few torturous seconds. 

When Samuel opened his mouth again, Daehwi actually held his breath. 

“We’re staying friends, right?” 

_What._

Samuel laughed, slightly nervous. “Don’t get me wrong, you’re great and all and I’m really having fun.” 

_Was this really happening?_

“But I think I just like you as a friend, not more. So like, what I’m saying is…” 

This was the exact opposite of what he had expected. He hadn’t been prepared to reject Samuel but he was even less prepared to _get_ rejected. 

“...We should definitely do this again. But then, just as friends. Hanging out. Not on a date. If that’s okay?” 

Daehwi took a second to grasp the situation fully and then an extra second to understand that Samuel had stopped talking and probably expected a reply. 

“It’s okay!” Daehwi quickly assured him. “I mean. Yes. I’m- I’m fine with that. Very. I definitely wanna stay friends. We’re great as friends.” 

He coughed shortly then sent Samuel a wide, hopefully not awkward smile. 

The other boy returned it and then gestured off to one side. “Wanna go back to join the others?” 

They found Daehwi’s friends nearly all accounted for around the same table they had left them at. The only ones missing were Jinyoung, which Daehwi hated because he kind of really needed to talk to him, and Woojin, which Daehwi also hated, which was the reason he needed to talk to Jinyoung. 

When he asked Sohye where either of them were, she gave a half shrug. “Jinyoung went to look for you guys, I think, because we were considering to leave and get burgers. Woojin… I’m not sure where he is.” She shrugged again. “He’ll be fine.” 

It threw him off slightly. Sohye had been the one to animate the others to actively look for Woojin when they lost him earlier that night. She had to know how uncomfortable he got in crowds, so why wasn’t she worried about him when he was, again, lost in a very crowded place? 

Still, she probably knew what she was talking about, so he turned to Jihoon instead and asked: “You can leave?” 

“I’m the master of this event. I can do as I please.” 

Daehwi didn’t let him get away so easily and after a few more seconds of inquisitive staring, Jihoon laughed and said: “I don’t have any other duties here besides getting this place cleaned up tomorrow.” 

“And he’s probably gonna make us do it, so he’s buying us ice cream and milkshakes at the diner.” Jinyoung announced from where he seemingly had appeared out of thin air behind Daehwi. 

“Sounds good”, he chuckled as Jihoon grimaced and silently complained about never having agreed to pay for all of them. 

The others started packing their things to leave for the diner, when Daehwi spoke up again. 

“Shouldn’t we wait for Woojin to get back…?” 

He was looking at Jihoon when he said it. Jihoon unofficially was in charge here, whether ‘here’ referred to the Bonfire or their friend group. Jihoon though, just sent a questioning look Sohye’s way. 

She sighed and pulled up her shoulders. It wasn’t quite a shrug, it looked more like she was uncomfortable. “He’s been gone for about an hour.” She explained. “He probably went home.” 

Something was off. Woojin wouldn’t have just gone home without telling anyone, at least Sohye or Jihoon, right? But they didn’t know exactly where he was and hadn’t for a while now and the crowd next to them was still there and consisted of a lot of loud people. Daehwi didn’t feel good about this. 

“You guys go ahead”, he told his friends. “I’ll go and check if I can find him. I’ll meet you at the diner in 20 minutes or something.” 

He sent them a small smile despite the nerves coiling in his stomach and slipped away before any of them could ask questions. 

He had possibly miscalculated again. There really were a lot of people and the fact that everyone was yelling and singing and dancing and _moving_ didn't make it easier to try and make out one specific person. On his way from one end of the field to the other, he managed to bump into Hyungseob. 

“Have you seen Woojin?”, he yelled over the music, and Hyungseob yelled back: “Not in the last few minutes, but I think he was near the bar when I saw him last, like half an hour ago?” 

Half an hour since the last time anyone saw Woojin was better than a full hour, Daehwi decided, and started making his way to the bar. 

Hyunmin and Donghan were on bar duty when he arrived there. Daehwi only vaguely knew the both of them from the various soccer games he saw and normally he would have been slightly nervous to talk to them, because upperclassmen he didn’t know were terrifying, but he had an agenda here. 

“Hey!”, he tapped Donghan’s shoulder to get his attention. “Was Woojin here?” 

The older boy nodded. “He left a while ago, though.” 

“Did he say where he was going?” 

Donghan shrugged and shook his head apologetically. 

“He can’t be that far away”, Hyunmin, who had listened in on their conversation, brought up. “Text him, maybe?” 

Right. Phones were a thing that existed. He thanked the two seniors and took a few steps from the crowd that had gathered around the bar, to slip his phone from his pocket. 

 

 _To: Woojin_

hey!!! where are you? :o  
sohye said you maybe went home, are you ok? 

 

He waited for a few minutes for a reply. After a full 6 of them without one, the nervous feeling in his stomach coiled up again and he went back into the crowd to look some more. He figured that the 20 minutes he had given himself and had told the others he would take were close to running out, but at the moment he couldn’t care less. 

He was close to the edge of the crowd, when he saw a figure breaking from it a few metres in front of him. They went straight through the picket fence encircling the field and seemed to hold onto it for stability. Daehwi would have thought they were drunk, if this wasn’t a school sponsored, 100% alcohol free event. 

He supposed there was always a way to illegally bring alcohol to these things, and maybe he should check on the person to help. 

After a few steps he recognised the hoodie they were wearing as familiar. 

After a few more, the person, a boy as he could see now, slowly sank into a sitting position against the fence. 

Daehwi finally got a glance at the boy’s face when a stray neon light illuminated it, and the recognition that settled in his stomach along with the nervousness made him speed up the last few strides to the boy’s side. 

“Woojin!” 

He crouched down right next to him, otherwise he wouldn’t have caught Woojin’s response: “‘Sup, Daehwi?”

He was probably trying to sound casual, but between his laboured breathing and his voice coming out more as a whisper, he didn’t quite manage. Daehwi wanted to believe that the artificial light around them was what painted Woojin’s face as pale as it seemed.

“What’s wrong? Sohye said he hadn’t seen you for an hour, where have you been?”

Woojin lifted his hand and pointed to the field filled with people in front of them. “There.” His fingers were shaking slightly. “Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine, never been better.”

“You’re hyperventilating.”

Woojin was silent for a moment, then said, even quieter than before. “I really don’t like crowds.” 

Daehwi didn’t really know what to do. He wanted to help, but he didn’t know how, so he just sat there helplessly, while Woojin’s breathing was still coming out in starts and his fingers clutched around his sleeves way too tightly. Carefully, and slow enough that Woojin could shake him off if he didn’t want the physical contact, Daehwi reached for one of his hands.  
When Woojin realized Daehwi’s fingers on his, he let go of his shirtsleeve and grabbed a hold on Daehwi’s hand instead. 

Daehwi squeezed his hand shortly and ran his thumb over the back of it. “You’re okay”, he said, hoping that Woojin could hear him over the noise around them and over the noise that was probably in his head. “I’m here.”

Woojin’s breathing slowly calmed down and his grip loosened bit by bit. 

After a beat more of silence, he added: “Can you help me up?”

“Are you sure you can stand?”, Daehwi was definitely not sure about that. 

“Not really”, Woojin admitted. “I just really wanna get out of here.”

Daehwi had known his casual demeanor from a few minutes ago to be an act but somehow, now that Woojin wasn’t trying to cover it up anymore, it hurt him even more to see the older like this. 

“Okay”, he said with a small nod. 

It was a struggle, Daehwi was tiny and Woojin was suffering through the remnants of a panic attack and wasn’t entirely in control over his limbs, but somehow they managed to stumble to the parking lot that separated the field from the rest of campus. It opened to the street on one side and Daehwi immediately steered Woojin that way, his arm still secure around the other’s back. His other hand held Woojin’s in place over his own shoulder, and Woojin squeezed it, to get his attention. “Where are we going?”, he asked. 

His voice was still a whisper, but now that they left all the people and the music behind and Woojin’s mouth was practically right next to Daehwi’s ear, he could hear him clearly. 

“I’m getting you home.” 

“I live half an hour from here. When you walk fast.”

“...I’m getting you to _my_ home.”

Daehwi only lived a few minutes from school, but being the human knot that they currently were they still took fifteen. After about half of the way Daehwi had checked back on how Woojin had been feeling, and he’d said he was fine, but he’d still had a vice grip on Daehwi’s hand, so Daehwi ignored his judgement and didn’t let go of him until they were in Daehwi’s room. There were enough pillows and carpets and stuffed animals around to cushion any fall, so Daehwi loosened his grip around Woojin’s middle and gently nudged him to sit down on his bed. 

“I’ll be back in 5 minutes”, he said, softly still, even though the situation didn’t call for it anymore. 

He waited for Woojin’s reaction (a tiny nod and an even tinier smile) before slipping off into the kitchen. 

His mother was out for dinner with Somi’s dad, or her other dad, or both? She had yelled from the kitchen while he had been taking a shower, he was just assuming she didn’t have to leave the country suddenly and would be home in a while, as usual. 

Generally that didn't bother him, he had more pressing issues at hand right now, but what did bother him was the fact that he had no idea where his mother put all their tea and tea in turn was crucial to the pressing issues at hand. 

The pressing issues at hand were Woojin, sitting in his room, had just been through an intense panic attack, was badly in need of chocolate-hazelnut tea and Daehwi badly wanted to make sure he was okay. He knew that Woojin’s panic attack had been caused by the crowd, the point was that Woojin knew that too, but he still had spent about an hour not with his friends, where there was no crowd, but in the crowd, where his friends had not been. Daehwi was convinced there was more to it and if it would help Woojin to talk about it, he would be there, with chocolate-hazelnut tea, listening. 

Five drawers he had to rummage through later, he tapped back into his room, a tray with two cups and some double chocolate chip cookies he had found in drawer #3 in hand and determination still in his mind. 

Woojin was sitting against the wall on his bed and was clutching onto the huge stuffed lion Somi had gotten him for his 10th birthday. It kind of looked like he was trying to make himself as small as possible and when he smiled at Daehwi, again, timidly, Daehwi could feel his heart clenching. 

(He’d once watched a movie with his mom, when he was 11 or 12, just a generic TV-movie with a predictable plot, Chad and Lizzy got together in the end, but it had prompted him to ask her about love. She had laughed and had told him the usual stuff, had told him about her first big love and then how she met his Dad and about the day he proposed. Daehwi had known most of that already. 

“In the movie just now”, he had pointed out. “Chad talked about falling in love with Lizzy’s smile. Didn’t he love her before that? What if I fall in love with someone, but they don’t have a pretty smile?” 

His mother had laughed. “It’s the other way around, honey. When you’re in love with someone, their smile will be the most beautiful thing in the world to you.” 

“So that’s what love is?” 

She had thought for a second, then shook her head. “It’s much more than that. A lot of people might smile at you and you could think that you’d like to see that smile all the time. But love… love is when they don’t smile everyday of their life, but you still want to do your best to give them a reason to. When you see someone happy and you see them sad and your heart feels for both of it, that’s when you’re in love.” )

He hadn’t quite understood her back then, but he thought he got it now.

Daehwi carefully set down the tray on the mattress between them and motioned to one of the cups. “It’s tea, Jinyoung’s mom made it. It has helped me through _so_ many things.” 

Woojin took a tentative sip and pulled up his eyebrows. “I didn’t know tea could taste like chocolate.” 

“Amazing, right?”, Daehwi smiled. Woojin mirrored his expression and leaned back against the wall before taking another sip. His eyes were focussed on the cup in his hands. 

Daehwi wanted him to know that he was here to listen to him if he needed it, but he didn’t want to make him uncomfortable, he didn’t want to pry. He kind of wished Jinyoung was there. Jinyoung was great at handling problems that required chocolate-hazelnut tea. Maybe he should call Jinyoung and ask him to come over. He remembered that his friends had been waiting for him at the diner before he got distracted. His phone was probably blowing up right now. Maybe calling Jinyoung would require too much explaining. But could he handle this himself, adequately? He wanted Woojin to feel better, he wanted- 

“You really don’t need to worry about me so much.” 

Woojin’s eyes were still on the cup when he spoke up. 

“I was just being stupid, I should have just left. But I didn't and I thought I would be okay, but I wasn't. But now I am, so please stop worrying so much, I can hear your brain working all the way over here.” 

His voice was still quiet but it had back some of the usual bright melody Daehwi was used to. Still, he was not ready to let it go completely. “Why should you have left? I mean, we were all still there… Did something happen?”, he tried, carefully. 

Woojin sighed. “Me and Sohye… We didn’t fight. It wasn’t even a disagreement really, I just kind of snapped at her. But it’s okay, we’ll be fine.” He added the last part after he caught a glance at Daehwi’s alarmed face. “I’ll talk to her tomorrow. It’s okay.” 

Daehwi briefly considered asking him about the not-fight with Sohye, but he assumed that if Woojin wanted to tell him, he would. So he just nodded to himself and went to sit back against the wall as well, closer next to Woojin. 

“Hey?” 

Woojin broke a silence Daehwi hadn’t even realized had been there. It had been a comfortable sort of silence, mixed with the faint scent of chocolate in the air and the soft light from the fairylights on Daehwi’s wall. 

“Hm?” When he looked up he found Woojin’s eyes already on him. 

“Thanks”, he said. “You know, for coming to look for me and taking me here. And the chocolate tea. And this little guy.” He patted the stuffed lion’s head once. “He’s fluffy.” 

The smile he gave Daehwi was bigger than all the ones he had given him earlier that night when he added: “You really didn’t have to do that, but you did, so...yeah. Thank you.” 

Daehwi gave back a smile that hurt his cheeks and he hoped it conveyed everything he wanted to say. 

_You’re welcome. I’ll gladly do it again. I want you to always be happy. Please never stop smiling._

_I’m kind of in love with you_

He didn’t say any of it. Instead, he scooted closer and rested his head on Woojin’s shoulder. He wasn’t sure why exactly he did it, but it felt like the right thing to do and when Woojin leaned his head against Daehwi’s and wrapped his arms closer around the fuzzy stuffed animal in his arms, Daehwi thought it might have been the best thing he ever decided to do. 

 

 

Woojin 

He had a lot of thoughts, at all times, but right now there seemed to be more than usual. 

Or maybe there was just one really loud thought being repeated over and over again.

Daehwi exhaled in a huff and shifted his head. Woojin could feel his even deep breaths against his clavicle now. 

He had fallen asleep about ten minutes ago and for ten minutes, Woojin had been worried to move a muscle and wake Daehwi up. 

After a few more minutes though, he could feel his shoulder starting to ache and risked shifting into a slightly more comfortable position. Daehwi stirred at the movement, and Woojin had an apology on his lips already, but instead of opening his eyes and accusing Woojin of everything bad that ever happened, Daehwi just shifted for another moment, before ultimately wrapping his arms around Woojin’s that he was resting against and cuddling up to him even closer. 

It filled Woojin’s chest with a tingly warm feeling, that he could feel creeping up onto his cheeks. He really hoped Daehwi wouldn’t wake up anytime soon. 

“Daehwi?”, he whispered, just to make sure. The other boy showed no reaction and Woojin released a small breath of relief before focusing his eyes back on the top of Daehwi’s head. 

The feeling in his chest grew even warmer, when he thought about the evening and Daehwi being there for him and just… being Daehwi. There had been so much more he’d wanted to tell him besides thanks, but he'd chickened out. They were friends after all, friends didn’t just blurt out their feelings for each other without context. 

_Well, there’s still no context but he isn’t even listening right now…_

The voice in his head had terrible ideas, Woojin knew this. 

“Daehwi?”, he tried again. And again, he got no reaction. 

0

So he continued talking. 

“I know I already said that you didn’t have to do all of that but… You really didn’t have to. And you did. And that’s just so-... _you’re_ so amazing. I hope you know how amazing you are. How amazing I think you are. I wish i could tell you this when you’re awake but I suck at this whole feelings thing… But there certainly are. Feelings. For you. I hope you also know that...But you probably don’t. And you’re asleep right now, I’m practically talking to myself.” 

His tiny chuckle that interrupted his whispered speech was equal parts nervousness and self depreciation for just how ridiculous he was being. 

He sighed and let his head lean back against Daehwi’s. 

Closing his eyes, he whispered: “Goodnight.” 

Even though Daehwi was still asleep and still couldn’t hear him. Some things still needed to be said even if nobody was listening. They were still true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i briefly considered making this way more angsty than it is now but it didnt feel right. so now we have more tea and feelings and shit
> 
> just if anyones confused i went back and changed woojin's sister's name bc i found her real one and it bothered me lakjfoifo
> 
> if you have any questions feel free to comment, or find me on [twitter](http://twitter.com/lilaliacs)


	3. part iii

Daehwi 

Dreams and sleep were things that Daehwi had never quite understood. If he was being honest, both of these things kind of annoyed him, out of different reasons.

While you were asleep you wasted precious time you could be using to do other, more interesting, more productive things, with literally doing nothing. 

For some while at the start of highschool he had been so fed up with this fact, that he spent about a month pulling as many all-nighters as he could. He would maybe have done it longer, if Somi and his mom hadn’t conspired against him and had more or less forced him into a healthy sleeping schedule. He found that after getting a full night's sleep, it was way easier to handle emotions and school, and life, really, so he stopped his thick-headed fight against sleep. 

“It’s an armistice.” He had told Jinyoung. “As soon as they come out with some scientific anti-sleep breakthrough, my eyes will never be closed again.” 

If that statement had unsettled Jinyoung, he hadn’t shown it. 

Dreams were another subject. They were scary. Daehwi hated the thought that his subconscious, a thing he couldn’t control, reminded him of that fact every night. As if it was a rebellious teenager, running around his brain, yelling: “ _You can’t control me!_ over and over again while spilling Daehwi’s deepest secrets and desires. 

He despised it. 

He especially despised the days when one of the desires his subconscious spilled made him think of things he’d rather not think about ever again. 

Today was one of these days. 

It was weird because usually when he had a dream he would wake up right afterwards and only remember very vague things about it, but this time it was the exact opposite. He felt like he had dreamt hours ago and when he woke up he remembered the dream itself in piercing detail. 

It had had no visual, just a deep comforting kind of black all around Daehwi and words that reached him like they were filtering through a thick curtain. Woojin’s voice. 

“ _...I hope you know how amazing you are. How amazing I think you are. I wish I could tell you this when you’re awake but I suck at this whole feelings thing… But there certainly are. Feelings. For you. I hope you also know that…_ ” 

He had never hated his stupid brain more than in this moment. He really didn’t need any daydreams or actual dreams about Woojin like he’d used to have them, not now, not when his plan to distract himself had backfired and he desperately needed a new one. And instead of coming up with one, his brain rather drowned him in annoyingly realistic reveries of things he promised himself he wouldn’t think about. _Thanks, buddy. Great teamwork there._

He wanted to think about something else, anything that wasn’t the words his mind had produced bouncing around in his head over and over again, but sleep was still clouding any clear thought he was trying to grasp and he kept coming back to warm darkness and an even warmer voice telling him exactly what he wanted to hear. 

In his memory- his fantasy, it sounded so real, like it really happened, like he was just replaying one of their conversations… 

Daehwi groaned quietly and went to bury his face in his pillow, only the pillow felt quite un-pillow-like. For one, is was way warmer than any pillow should be. Two, it definitely didn’t smell like his mother’s favourite detergent. Three, it moved. 

_Maybe_ , his sleepy mind concluded, _Maybe this isn’t your pillow._

Stupid sleepy mind. What else would it be? 

Daehwi readjusted his position again, determined to stop thinking about Woojin and pillows and in general and just go back to sleep, when his pillow moved again, as did something on Daehwi’s back. 

Slowly, he blinked one eye open, but all he saw was dark red fabric, so he opened his other eye too, still to no avail. He lifted his head just as slowly and narrowed his eyes again as soon as the sun filtering in through his bedroom window fell into his face.

After a few more blinks his eyes finally adjusted to the brightness and he found himself looking down at his pillow, which really was not a pillow, he could see that, but he still needed a few extra seconds to understand. 

Woojin yawned, and as he did he subconsciously tightened the arm he had slung around Daehwi’s back. 

That was apparently the reality check Daehwi’s mind needed because the next things it registered were all in rapid succession and each more unnerving than the one before. 

Woojin was there with him. 

He was quite literally laying on top of Woojin. 

Woojin was keeping him pinned there with an arm around his waist. 

They had slept like that. Cuddling. 

They had cuddled. 

Woojin was blinking up at him and it was the most beautiful thing Daehwi had ever witnessed. 

“Hi”, Woojin said and Daehwi had to correct himself, because _that_ was the most beautiful thing he had ever witnessed. 

Then Woojin smiled sleepily at him and Daehwi gave up on correcting himself. 

“Good morning”, he tried to sound calm and collected but the way he squeaked out the words didn’t really help his case. 

Woojin didn’t acknowledge the mental breakdown that had to be evident on Daehwi’s face. Instead, he squeezed his eyes shut once, as if to wake himself up fully, then opened them again and grinned. “You comfy up there?” 

How was he still not aware of Daehwi losing his shit literally 5 inches away from his face? 

“I...Uh, yeah! Totally. Uhm, are- I mean. Are you? Comfy? I can move, if you aren’t, I can totally do that, I’m-” 

Woojin laughed. He had the audacity to laugh. He also had the audacity to sling his other arm around Daehwi’s other side and keep him trapped where he was, with no hope at escape or peace for his poor, poor heart. 

“I’m good.”, he said and Daehwi forced his mouth shut. Stupid mouth. He tried to force his heartbeat to slow down but it didn’t. Stupid heart. 

None of them said anything for a while, Woojin just kept smiling up at him and Daehwi tried not to stare while simultaneously trying not to freak out too obviously. He didn’t think he was doing a very good job at either. 

Suddenly, Woojin spoke up again, very quietly: “Thanks again for last night.” 

He wasn’t looking directly at Daehwi anymore when he continued: “You really didn’t have to, but you did it and you didn’t even question it and...yeah, thank you. Really.” 

It was so similar to the words that had been echoing through Daehwi’s mind when he had woken up. In fact, it was so similar that for a second Daehwi wondered if maybe the words hadn’t been a dream at all. 

But that was ridiculous. 

He shook his head. “It was no big deal.” 

After a short moment of consideration, he added: “Are you feeling all better now?” 

Woojin’s smile was back. “I’m feeling great.” 

Daehwi mirrored his expression and they just looked at each other like that for a few of Daehwi’s rapid heartbeat. 

He wondered if Woojin could feel it against his own chest. He wondered if he should say something. 

He was just about to open his mouth, when he heard the telltale creak of his bedroom door. Shortly after a much louder noise. His mother. 

“Oh, good, you’re awake! I’m not interrupting anything, right? I checked on you a while ago but you were still fast asleep. It was adorable, I considered taking a few pictures and send them to Jinyoung but I thought you wouldn’t appreciate that Daehwi, so I didn’t. Don’t look at me like that, I didn’t. I promise!” 

Daehwi hadn’t even been aware he had been narrowing his eyes at her. 

Woojin slowly drew back his arms from around Daehwi. When Daehwi’s eyes flicked down to him again, his cheeks were dusted with a soft shade of pink. It was a very similar shade to the one that Daehwi’s insides sometimes felt like. 

“Morning Mrs. Lee, I’m sorry I’m just here without warning, it was jus-” 

“Ah ah.” Daehwi’s mother waved her hand around as if to wipe Woojin’s apology away. “You’re always welcome here, sweetheart, don’t worry. You could move in here and I wouldn’t complain.” 

Daehwi hid his face behind one of his hands. “...Mom.” 

“I’m just saying! Anyways, I have to leave and run some errands now and there's quite literally no food in the house, but I left you some money in the kitchen so you can go out and get pancakes somewhere or something, alright?” 

She seemed to think for a second while looking at them, then added quickly: “Not right now of course. You were in the middle of something. I’ll leave. Goodbye, love you, enjoy the pancakes!” 

They heard the apartment door slam shut not more than 10 seconds later. 

“Your mom hates me.” 

“...What about her offering you to move in here makes you think that?” 

Woojin raised his eyebrows and explained: “If I was a mother I would hate every random teenage boy who shows up in the middle of the night unannounced and who I then find in compromising positions with my child the next morning.” 

Daehwi suppressed a chuckle and instead matched Woojin earnest expression. “Well, my mother is buying you pancakes so maybe you just don’t have the same parenting strategy.” 

They managed to stare at each other with their mirroring expressions for not longer than a second before both of them collapsed into giggles. Daehwi wasn’t entirely sure why they were laughing but what he was sure about was that it helped a great deal to ease the bright pink chaos that had been building in his chest as well as the air of awkwardness that his mother had left them in. 

Woojin’s arms weren’t keeping Daehwi in place anymore, so he managed to nearly roll off the bed during their laughing fit. Before gravity could win and he could collide with the floor though, he abruptly sat up. 

“So.” 

Woojin copied his actions. “So”, he repeated. 

Daehwi couldn’t help another small chuckle and Woojin grinned back at him. 

“Pancakes”, Daehwi announced. 

Woojin nodded. “Pancakes.” 

 

________________________ 

 

“So kind of you to be gracing us with your presence, I haven’t seen you around in ages.” Zhengting didn’t bother to give them a proper greeting. “I thought you found a new hipster niche café to hang out at.” 

“We were here literally two days ago, you just never seem to work.” Woojin pointed out, while they got settled in their usual booth. 

“Touché.” 

Zhengting stared out of the window with a dreamy kind of expression for precisely 14 seconds (Daehwi counted), before a thought seemed to strike him suddenly (Daehwi could basically see the moment of realization in his eyes.) 

“It’s Saturday”, he observed. 

“It sure is.” Woojin absentmindedly confirmed while thumbing through the pastel coloured menu in front of him, as if he didn’t already have it memorised. 

“You’re never here on Saturdays. I would know. I’m always here on Saturdays.” He quickly whirled around to check on the clock on the wall. “It’s _the morning_. Why are you here so early?” 

“We want pancakes.” Woojin answered. 

“It’s not even that early.” Daehwi interjected. 

“It’s barely after 10 AM, that’s basically still the middle of the night for a highschool student.” Zhengting chipped while jabbing down something on a small notebook, presumably pancakes. “And didn’t you have some kind of party at school yesterday? Literally, why are you-” 

He interrupted himself with a dramatic gasp. “Is this what I think it is?” 

They both gave him a few seconds to elaborate but when it didn’t seem like he would, Daehwi took the risk to ask: “What do you think it is?” 

The gleam in Zhengting’s eyes didn’t promise anything good but the question was already out. 

In a stage whisper that perfectly conveyed the excitement shining in his eyes, he answered: “Pancakes of shame.” 

“What?” Daehwi asked while Woojin at the same time groaned: “No.” 

The gleam in Zhengting’s eyes stayed where it was, now joined by a wide grin. “I’m kind of getting mixed signals here.” 

“There’s no mixed signals. There’s no signals at all. Can you please just give us pancakes?” Woojin seemed to be in physical pain. 

“Of shame.” Zhengting added. Daehwi still didn’t know what was going on. 

“There’s no such thing as pancakes of shame, Zhengting. Get your head out of the gutter!” 

“Why would you be ashamed of pancakes?” Daehwi really would like to know what was going on, but he hadn’t actually meant to voice that out loud. 

“Oh, Daehwi”, Zhengting shook his head, the smile was still there. “Oh sweet, innocent Daehwi. Let me explain. When two people-” 

“He’s being stupid and making a stupid world play on ‘walk of shame’, because he’s stupid. You know what that is. We can talk about literally anything else now.” Woojin didn’t look up from the menu he was still holding, but Daehwi could see the tips of his ears turning red. 

“Oh.” He coughed. “Yeah, no. That’s not what’s happening. Can you give us food please?” 

Zhengting pointed a single finger at him. “That’s my job.” 

Then he retreated into the kitchen but Daehwi felt like he was still conspiratorially smiling at them through two walls. 

“That-”, Daehwi started. 

“He-”, Woojin spoke up at the same time. They both chuckled and Daehwi gestured for Woojin to talk. 

“He’s always like that. Once he had a whole interrogation with Euiwoong on Hyungseob’s behalf… felt like something out of a crime show.” 

“Sounds terrifying.” 

“Back then it was mostly hilarious, Hyungseob live-texted me the whole thing. He thought it was quite terrifying though.” 

“And Euiwoong?” 

“He held his ground. They’re still dating, aren’t they?” 

Daehwi thought that was a fair point and nodded. Zhengting didn’t seem like he could be thoroughly intimidating and Euiwoong _was_ intimidating. 

He was also glad that they weren’t talking about shameful breakfast food anymore and more than happy to keep the conversation about their friends alive. 

“I never texted the others yesterday that we weren’t coming to the diner…” Daehwi mentioned. He had purposefully ignored his phone that morning and left it on his bedside table. It was quite possibly still blowing up with texts and calls. 

“I have mine in my pocket but I’m scared to look at it.” If the look of worry on Woojin’s face hadn’t been completely warranted, Daehwi would have laughed. But their friends were vicious. 

He sighed, Woojin chuckled. 

“They’ll have our heads, Woojin!” 

He was talking with honest concern, but Woojin chuckled again and shrugged. 

“They probably won’t do it in public, right?” 

“That’s the thing. They’re schemers. They’ll scheme. They’ll make it look like an accident.” 

Woojin didn’t reply. Instead he reached into the pocket of his hoodie for his phone. When he unlocked it, his eyes widened a bit.  
“This is a lot of texts.” 

Daehwi’s voice was an intense whisper when he repeated: “They’ll have our heads.” 

“Well” -Woojin’s eyes had a glint in them that told Daehwi he was probably going to agree with whatever idea Woojin came up with- “Then we might as well just get it over with.” 

Daehwi did not agree. He would rather not talk to any of their friends right now. He would rather not answer any questions, both because he didn’t have answers and didn’t have the nerves to. He would rather just sit here with Woojin, eat pancakes, laugh about his dumb jokes and see his dumb smile and then maybe go back home and accidentally cuddle some more and repeat that the next day and for all of eternity. That concept, Daehwi could agree with. 

Woojin pressed a few buttons and brought the phone up to his ear. Daehwi could hear Jihoon even though the call wasn’t on speaker. 

“You son of a bitch, _where_ are you?!” 

“Morning, Sunshine.”, Woojin answered cheerfully. There was some more noise from the other side of the line, Daehwi couldn’t tell if it was more of Jihoon yelling or just general commotion.

“Wait”, Woojin interrupted whatever it was. “Are you at my house?” 

More commotion. 

“Okay, well, stop my Dad from calling the cops. I’m fine.” 

A quieter pause. 

“If I tell you where I am, will you animate the others to form an angry mob and join us for some pancakes?... Thought so. Zhu’s. See you in ten, love you.” He made kissy noises at the speaker while Daehwi could very distinctly hear Jihoon yelling again from the other side, before hanging up. 

Right when he put his phone back into his pocket, Zhengting reemerged from the kitchen with a overdimensional plate of pancakes and the same grin that he left them with. 

“As many pancakes as I could make before I got bored, for my two lovebirds.” 

Woojin ignored him in favour of scooting a fork closer to Daehwi. “Enjoy the last supper.” 

“Oh, I get it, I get it, you want your privacy, that’s cool, pretend I was never here.” 

“I wish I could”, Woojin murmured, only for Daehwi to hear and then directed his attention at the food. 

Daehwi tried to do the same but he’d seemingly took a wrong turn in directing because suddenly his mind was way back to when he had woken up. 

Their friends would be there any minute, full of anger and confusion and questions and Daehwi couldn’t help but feel like his time was running out. For what, he didn’t know. He only knew that as soon as their friends would walk through that door, whatever little alternate reality he and Woojin were in right now -where they fell asleep cuddling and woke up with easy smiles on their faces and went and got pancakes together- it would shatter. Instead, they’d return to their actual reality where they were entirely nothing more than friends and had a lot of other friends and Daehwi _loved_ their friends but also in that actual reality he had to deal with his unrequited feelings and couldn’t just ignore them. He would’ve liked to ignore them. He would have liked to ignore reality and have hope instead. Hope for more breakfast dates to come, hope for more of Woojin’s smiles to be meant for him and him alone, hope for the words his mind had fabricated this morning to maybe, possibly, be reality. 

But these things belonged to an alternative timeline. 

And when Somi was through the door first, demanding 3 different explanation as well as a ice cream fruit special sundae at the same time, Daehwi accepted it as the official end to his’ and Woojin’s soft pink alternate universe. 

Listening to Jinyoung naming him the reason of every grey hair that would ever grow on him helped a great deal to root him to reality, and even though Woojin’s easy laughter when Sohye wrapped him in a dramatic hug reverberated in his chest deeper than before, he ignored it. He was really trying his best. 

 

 

Woojin 

School had never been Woojin’s priority in life. He did what was necessary to not fail his classes, a minimum of homework and avoided extra assignments and presentations like the plague and until now it had worked for him. But with senior year coming around, so did the feeling of impending doom that he hadn’t been able to shake off ever since the first day back to school. 

Mrs. Romaine was the teacher in charge of organisational First-Day-Back business that was usually held at the start of each school year. Woojin had never thought that something out of the woman’s mouth could terrify him as much as the outlook she gave the seniors on their future did. Of course he had thought about college applications and internships and all that before, but somehow it seemed 100% realer and more crushing when his drama teacher adorned it with statistics and actual due dates and weird old-people-jokes here and there. 

From the start of his freshman year on, Woojin had put his all into getting a soccer scholarship for a college somewhere. It wasn’t that he was particularly unintelligent or couldn’t do well in class, he was just downright lazy. Why put his all into subjects he couldn’t care less about to get into a decent college, when he could reach the same result with playing a sport he loved? 

At least that had been his mindset until Mrs.Romaine destroyed it with a warm chuckle and a statistic on sport scholarships that Woojin didn’t fully understand but it terrified him nonetheless. 

For the first time in his academic career, exams and grades seemed important enough to stress about them, but even so, he found he was so used to his habits of being a lazy student that it was hard to break them. 

He had never been amazing in music class. Musical theory made his head hurt and so did the boring classical pieces they had to analyse and listen to over and over again. The fact that he could neither play an instrument, nor hold a tune didn’t help his case at all. 

It had always been like that and he had made his peace with it, just as he had made his peace with sucking at history and being completely dependent on Donghyun’s tutoring to scrape by in that class. That peace was destroyed by Mrs. Romaine’s Powerpoint Presentation of Upcoming Doom. 

Woojin thought about how music may not make up a lot of his final score and how it probably would never be important again, not even for the colleges he maybe, possibly would apply to, but the big looming ‘What If?’ that Mrs. Romaine had planted into all of her students’ heads begged to differ. 

He really didn’t want to fail any of his classes for real. 

His father had tried to calm his fraying nerves by reminding him that he had never actually failed a class before, even if it had been by sheer luck sometimes. But Woojin was scared that in senior year, barely scraping by wouldn't work and that in senior year it would have an actual impact on the rest of his life if it didn’t. 

He would never tell anyone, especially not his father because it would just make him worry even more than he already did and especially not Daehwi because that would make Daehwi pity him even more than he already did, but the music assignment had nearly made him cry several times before he had asked Daehwi for help. He hadn’t understood one part of it, it made up 50% of his final music grade and after a good few hours of overthinking he had come to the conclusion that it would set the tone for every final he was still to write and would therefore destroy his entire score and his life. 

This Monday morning, the music classroom seemed way more threatening than a room littered in colourful informational posters meant for children should be. Woojin felt like all the faces drawn on the instruments in these posters were mocking him when his teacher entered the room. In his hands he had a bright purple manila folder that held all of their assignments. Red on white these papers held the outlook on the rest of Woojin’s highschool career. 

He flipped the flute on his right off in his head and turned to the front as his teacher started telling them about their results. 

________________ 

“Excuse me. Sorry. Coming through! Oh god I’m so sorry, that was my fault, I really have to hurry. Sorry. Could I jus- Daehwi! Daehwi, wait up!” 

The school corridors were torture when you really had somewhere you wanted to be. Unmotivated students were like immovable objects, but Woojin’s determination was an unstoppable force. It took him way longer than it should have to get through to Daehwi on the other side of the hallway, but when he was standing in front of him there was still a grin on his face. 

“B.”, he huffed out. 

“What?”, Daehwi tipped his head to one side in confusion. Woojin thought it was the most adorable thing he had seen. 

“I got a B.”, he repeated and he could feel the corners of his lips lift even more. “In the music assignment.” 

Realisation dawned on Daehwi’s face, as did a wide smile. “Oh my god, really?” 

Woojin nodded and couldn’t help a laugh from escaping. Daehwi laughed too, whooped and suddenly they were hugging and Woojin was way too excited to care about the sudden physical proximity. 

“Your theoretical torture methods did this!”, he yelled into Daehwi’s ear and he could hear the other’s laugh next to his. 

Somehow, the sound and its proximity got through the haze of Woojin’s excitement and he was suddenly very aware of his hands around Daehwi’s waist and Daehwi’s chin on his shoulder and his own heartbeat. It wasn’t the first time they'd been this close of course, Woojin still very vividly remembered waking up two days ago with Daehwi in his arms blinking down at him. 

Now was really not the time for that memory. Or for his confusing feelings in general. This was just a hug between friends and Woojin’s mind needed to come out of the gutter right now. But it was mocking him from down there. 

_This is awfully long for a hug between friends_ , it sneered. 

It was right, theoretically. Woojin just really didn’t want to let go. Daehwi really helped him with this, he tried to reason with himself. This was a long hug of thankfulness and nothing more.

His mind scoffed. 

He felt Daehwi slowly pull back and he really, really hoped that he hadn’t realized that Woojin had been lingering a tad bit too long. Looking at the other’s face when they had let go of each other he couldn’t find a trace of that realization there, but he couldn’t help the blush creeping up his neck. Woojin brought a hand up to his neck, whether to cover up the blush or because he just didn’t know what else to do with his hands he didn’t know. 

He laughed awkwardly and Daehwi smiled back. Woojin hoped he didn’t just smile out of pity because he saw how much Woojin was struggling. He hoped Daehwi didn’t see how much he was struggling in general. 

“Um”, he spoke up. “How about I pay you back.” 

Daehwi’s eyes widened. “You really don’t have to.” He chuckled. “I did that for free.” 

Woojin huffed out another awkward laugh. “I know.” His fingers were fidgeting around the hem of his shirt in lack of better occupation. “You just really saved my ass with this and I wanted to properly thank you. How about we get ice cream after school? At Zhu’s? My treat?” 

Daehwi gasped dramatically: “You’ll _pay_ for ice cream there?” 

Woojin’s laugh this time was a real one and not as awkward as the ones before. Daehwi had developed a talent for diffusing awkward situations between them with light-hearted jokes. In the course of it, Woojin had realized that Daehwi probably could make him laugh with anything he said, he was just that far gone. 

“Everything for you.” Woojin joked and winked exaggeratedly. Daehwi rolled his eyes but still laughed, Woojin counted it as a win. 

“Alright, see you after school then. I’ll meet you by your locker.” 

Woojin ignored the initial reflex to exaggeratedly wink again. Instead, he did the next worst thing and threw in some finger guns for good measure: “I’ll be waiting.” 

Daehwi walked away while shaking his head at him and as soon as he was around the corner, Woojin turned around and hid his face in his hands. “Finger guns”, he murmured to himself. “ _Finger guns._ Get it together, Woojin.” 

Getting it together seemed not to be in his near future, with the way his heart was doing salti in his chest. He would like to yell at it to calm down, he hadn’t asked Daehwi out. Daehwi had agreed to free ice cream and hanging out with a friend, not a date. His heart didn’t seem to care, as it was running around screaming in Woojin’s ribcage. 

 

_____________________ 

“Ah, my favourite customers!” 

“That’s a lie, Zhengting. Jihoon and Sohye are your favourite customers.” Woojin objected as he and Daehwi settled at the table. 

“True, Jihoon funds my college tuition basically by his own with the money he spends here and Sohye is just a wonderful presence.” Zhengting nodded, as he finished wiping down a different table. “But”, he emphasised as he put the cloth away. “Jihoon and Sohye don’t have interesting romantic tension that has yet to be solved. Therefore you two take the title for now.” 

He grinned as Daehwi hid his face in his arms on the table and Woojin groaned: “There is no interesting romantic tension, how many times do I have to tell you this?” 

That was a half lie, there was a lot of romantic tension, but it was not between them, not a mutual thing, it was only in Woojin’s chest and frankly none of Zhengting’s business. 

“Look, all I’m saying is this is the second time in three days that you two are here on your own. Together. Just the two of you.” 

“Friends hang out together, Zhengting!” 

“They sure do”, Zhengting agreed, but his wiggling eyebrows still made Woojin want to yell at him. He didn’t though, because Zhengting still had to make their food. 

“What can I get you two?” 

Woojin sighed. “One of those chocolate sundaes that Donghyun thinks could kill a man.” He waved in Daehwi’s direction. “And whatever he’s having.” 

When he met Zhengting’s eyes again, the older’s eyebrows were still wiggling and Woojin did not appreciate it. “Friends pay for each other’s food sometimes, Zhengting.” He said exasperatedly. 

“They sure do”, Zhengting agreed. Before Woojin could stuff the menu into his mouth, he had disappeared into the kitchen. 

He had to admit that the main reason why Zhengting’s comments annoyed him so much was because they were essentially true. Everything he implied that Woojin felt for Daehwi, he probably did. 

The problem was that Zhengting found it funny how there were, apparently, mutual feelings involved and Woojin hated the fluttering feeling of hope these comments gave him. It was like his heart was willing to latch on to Zhengting’s words and never let go even if it was as hopeless as impossible. Woojin just wanted to spare his pathetic feelings-lump the pain. 

_And yet you spend as much time with him as possible,_ his mind reasoned. 

Of course he spent time with Daehwi. They were friends and all their other friends hung out together, Woojin didn’t really have a choice but to also hang out with Daehwi. 

_This right now though is very voluntary and it’s also very voluntarily just the two of you._

Well. Yes. It was just the two of them because they were celebrating the assignment which they had studied for together and- Who was he kidding? 

Woojin was sitting in an ever growing pile of complicated feelings and lies to himself. He was seeking out Daehwi’s company at every chance he got and every time they were together he noticed new things about the boy that made his heart sting and his stomach flutter and every time he told himself that he shouldn’t get this attached but he always came back and did the same thing again. 

He listened to Zhengting’s words and imagined a reality where they were true. He revelled in the moments when he made Daehwi laugh, in the way his laugh seemed to fill up Woojin’s heart and made him feel like he was drowning in the best way imaginable. He sometimes caught himself lingering too long when they incidentally touched, his skin tingling in a weird way wherever Daehwi’s had been before. 

Sometimes he got lost in his own thoughts in these moments. He wondered what would happen if he told Daehwi how his laugh made him feel. He wondered what would happen if he simply held Daehwi’s hand whenever he wanted to. Most of all he wondered what would happen if Zhengting was right. 

“Are you alright?” 

Daehwi’s voice seemed impossibly loud when it suddenly cut through the silence that had filled the room after Zhengting had left. Woojin hoped it hadn’t been an awkward one. He had been too occupied with his thoughts to notice. 

“Uh”, he intelligently started.”Yeah, I’m good, just-” _Honestly falling in love with you haha. No biggie._ “-Just a bit tired.” 

Daehwi furrowed his brows. “You really need to sleep more on weekends.” 

“I slept just fine on Friday.” Woojin pointed out. 

“That’s when you were sleeping over at mine.” 

“Well, yeah.” 

“Maybe you should spontaneously sleep over more often then.” 

Daehwi’s last sentence had been so much quieter than the previous ones that Woojin suspected it hadn’t been meant for him to hear. When Daehwi realized that he had in fact heard, he sputtered: “I mean. Uhm. You. You need the sleep.” 

Somehow, Daehwi being flustered made Woojin flustered. This conversation was the prime example of a mess but all his mind seemed to be able to take away from it was how cute it was that Daehwi cared for him. That was of course far more important to think about than a way to diffuse this awkward situation. 

Fortunately, or not, Zhengting came back at that moment, destroying the awkward tension of the moment but no doubt about to create a new one. 

“You know, Donghyun might be right with his chocolate death theory. I just made this so believe me when I say, I wouldn’t be surprised if it killed you.” He said, as he sat down the sugary monstrosity in front of Woojin. 

“You also wouldn't be sad”, Woojin added. 

“You said it, not me.” When Woojin stuck out his tongue at him, Zhengting laughed. “It’s okay, I’m sure Daehwi would be sad, wouldn't you Daehwi?” 

“Devastated.” Daehwi deadpanned while gnawing at a strawberry. 

“Aw c’mon” Zhengting whined. “Who’ll you have sleepovers with then?” 

“You eavesdropped on us?!” 

“Woojin, friend, these walls are not thick, I don’t have another choice but to eavesdrop.” 

“I honestly can’t believe you.” 

“I get that a lot.” 

“You know what this place should have?” Daehwi interjected, probably to diffuse the situation. 

Woojin pointed a finger at him. “Customer service we can complain to.” 

“What are we, Starbucks?!” Zhengting seemed outraged by the idea. 

“I’m not talking about customer service!” Daehwi interjected. He ignored Woojin’s muttered: “Well, you _should_ be.” and continued: “This place should have fairylights.” 

“That’s a brilliant idea!” Zhengting exclaimed at the same time that Woojin asked: “What’s your thing with fairylights?” 

“His room is littered with them”, he added when he saw Zhengting’s confused face. 

“Fairylights are pretty! Every room should have fairylights because it would make every room prettier.” Daehwi sounded less defensive than pragmatic. 

Zhengting shrugged. “Seems like sound science to me. I’ll buy some fairylights.” 

“Yay!” Daehwi grinned and when he did, Woojin could only barely refrain from immediately getting up and buying the whole supply of fairylights in the world for him if it meant Daehwi would smile like that. 

_God, shut up,_ his mind begged him. 

“Okay kids, I actually have stuff to attend to, you’ll be alright here on your own for 10 minutes right?” Zhengting clasped his hands together and looked at them in question. 

“You’re leaving us alone...In your café?” Daehwi asked. 

Zhengting nodded. “If you need anything while I’m gone it’s in the kitchen, Woojin knows where everything is, you can just get it yourself.” 

“It’s quite literally your job to do that.” Woojin laughed. 

“I’m aware of this, but in 20 minutes it’s Hyungseob's job to do that and he annoyed me into picking him up. So I’ll do that now. See you in ten, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” He winked and then breezed out the door. 

Woojin stared after him for a second, then huffed: “I can’t believe him.” 

Daehwi chuckled. “He gets that a lot.” 

They fell into comfortable silence after that. Daehwi watched cars drive by through the window and Woojin used his attention momentarily being elsewhere to steal one of his strawberries. Daehwi noticed and pouted at him and when Woojin’s heart felt all weird because Daehwi was just _that_ adorable, he told it to get its shit together. That was just how his life was going now apparently. 

He smiled back and lifted up a spoon of chocolate ice cream as a peace offering. Daehwi pouted at him for a few more seconds but when the spoon in front of his face didn’t move away he eventually complied. 

The action was weirdly intimate and it made Woojin allow himself to imagine what it would be like if they weren’t friends, if they were more than that. It wouldn’t be weird to feed his boyfriend ice cream, right? 

He realized that in addition to that, it didn’t feel weird at all to refer to Daehwi as his boyfriend in his mind. The feeling it gave him reminded him of the sweet and rich taste of the ice cream and just for a moment he let himself wonder if Daehwi would agree, let himself play with the thought to simply ask. But that was where he shut himself up, the stinging in his chest interrupted his saccharine thought process. 

Daehwi’s phone lit up with a message. Woojin could make out an upside down “Sammy”, before Daehwi picked it up and went to type out a reply. 

Right. Samuel. 

After everything that happened Friday night, Woojin had forgotten the initial reason why Sohye had talked to him. Getting down to it Samuel had been the reason for everything- but that wasn’t fair and Woojin knew it. 

Samuel wasn’t at fault here, he hadn’t done anything wrong. He didn’t know about Woojin’s feelings and he didn’t have to care. In fact, Woojin could blame the younger boy for virtually nothing here. Samuel had had the guts to do what Woojin was too scared to and asked Daehwi out and that was just how it was right now. 

Daehwi and Samuel went on dates together and had fun together and made each other laugh and wrote each other cutesy text messages, probably, and if Woojin was being honest that could have never been him and Daehwi anyways. They were friends after all, and apparently they were never meant to be anything more than that. 

He should have made his peace with this weeks ago and he wished he could. He wished he could believe what he told Sohye, that he was fine with just being Daehwi’s friend and he wished he could shut his dumb heart up for good. 

Sometimes he felt like he could do it, when they were just joking around and in the middle of a normal conversation, doing things that friends did. 

But then he would wake up with Daehwi in his arms or Daehwi would let Woojin feed him ice cream for consolation or Daehwi would smile that beautiful smile and make Woojin feel like it was meant only for him and his heart would start to sting and his mind started running in circles and he could absolutely not do it. 

Right now was definitely one of those moments. 

His thoughts were running a mile an hour and his stomach felt weird and Daehwi was just sitting there, was everything to solve the mess knotted up in Woojin’s chest, and had no idea. And that’s how it would always be because Daehwi was texting Samuel right now and he was smiling and Woojin wanted him to keep smiling. If Samuel was the one to make him smile then that was how it was and if Woojin had to deal with feeling weird about it then he would. 

But right now he felt like he couldn’t.

He slowly let his spoon drop back into the bowl and reached for his backpack on the floor next to him. 

“Hey, listen”, he started but had to clear his throat because it felt like all the thoughts he had were trying to force their way out with the words. “I just remembered I promised my sister to help her with a project for school this week, so I really gotta run.” 

It felt so awfully much like a bad excuse that he could only barely force himself to not visibly cringe. Daehwi though just nodded, a concerned expression on his face. “Oh, yeah, of course! I, um...tell Yerim good luck for her project from me, yeah?” 

“Definitely.” Woojin forced a smile onto his lips. He fished some money out of his pocket and put it down on the table. “For the ice cream”, he explained. “Thanks again for helping me.” 

Daehwi smiled, a real, genuine, making-Woojin’s-heart-sting smile and it was all Woojin could do to walk out of the café slowly, and not full on sprint all the way home. 

 

 

 

Daehwi 

Something had just happened and Daehwi wasn’t sure what. 

Woojin had nearly looked uncomfortable when he left the café but Daehwi really couldn’t tell what would have caused that. They had just been hanging out, there hadn’t even been one of the awkward moments they sometimes had when Daehwi’s feelings got in the way of his normal behaviour- not even when Woojin had fed him ice cream spontaneously. He was quite proud of that, actually. He had held his composure. A small success. 

Of course the sense of victory hadn’t lasted long because Woojin quite literally had fled the scene. 

Daehwi’s mind somersaulted. He caught himself thinking about multiple terrible possible reasons for Woojin’s sudden departure. 

Woojin was terminally ill and kept it a secret so as to not hurt anyone.  
Daehwi had zoned out completely for a few minutes and accidentally confessed all his deepest secrets while he wasn’t paying attention.  
Woojin actually hated him with his whole being.  
All options were terrifying. And all of them were ridiculous, he knew that in theory. But what he knew and what his mind focussed on where usually polar opposites. 

He was still sitting in absolute silence, brooding over the remnants of his ice cream, when the door opened and Zhengting and Hyungseob’s loud conversation filtered in. 

“-it was crazy. Oh, hey Daehwi!” Hyungseob waved and Daehwi managed to smile back, if a tad bit too late. 

“Where’d the love of your life disappear to?” Zhengting inquired, eyeing the vacant seat across from Daehwi. The small rest of ice cream that Woojin had left in his bowl was starting to melt. 

“I don’t know.” Daehwi shrugged. He could have just told Zhengting the reason Woojin had named for leaving, but it had been a bad excuse and he didn’t see the point in sharing it. (Yerim might very well have a school project due, but Daehwi knew for a fact that she wouldn't ask Woojin of all people to help her with it. She wasn’t stupid.) 

“Sounds like a good story, leave me some of it.” Hyungseob ordered, before he disappeared to the back, probably to get changed. 

Zhengting sat down in the spot Woojin had left only 10 minutes ago. “So what’s up?” 

“Nothing”, Daehwi tried to sound nonchalant. “What should be up?” 

“I don’t know, you tell me.” The humorous glint had disappeared from Zhengting’s face and for the first time since knowing him, Daehwi remembered that Zhengting was a real adult, with real life experience. Maybe he could give Daehwi some real advice. 

The miles his mind was still running made it seem worth a shot. 

“Woojin left.”, he started. 

“No shit” Zhengting replied. Daehwi sighed. 

“I don’t know why he did. He named an obviously made up reason and- I don’t know, nothing happened to make him wanna leave as far as I know?” 

He was still cautious to share all of his thoughts with someone who wasn’t Jinyoung or Somi or Guanlin. But Zhengting nodded and looked at him like he knew that there was more that Daehwi wanted to say and the look in his eyes made Daehwi feel like he could tell him. It surprised him to some degree since he was basically playing directly into Zhengting’s annoying running gag with it, but there were just so many confusing feelings and he honestly needed all the help he could get. 

“I’m kind of worried about it. Too worried I guess.” 

That peaked Zhengting’s interest. “Why’s that?” 

“Well… I guess it’s because I care a lot about what he thinks about me and I’m worried that he left because of me-” 

He had been ready to weave his words for long enough that at some point Zhengting would have gotten the hint and understand what Daehwi could have just said with one simple sentence (“I have a big fat crush on him.”) But he didn’t have to do that, because the older cut him off. 

“I’m gonna stop you right there. You’re on a completely wrong train of thought.” 

_I know that_ , Daehwi wanted to tell him. _My stupid feelings just don’t._

“Why would he leave because of you when he only came here because of you?” 

Daehwi thought that question didn’t make a lot of sense. Many things could happen during a conversation that could make one party want to leave even if they had been very invested in it. He wanted to tell Zhengting as much, but was interrupted again before he could even finish taking the breath for it. 

“Woojin is a simple man, Daehwi. He doesn’t change his mind that quickly. And especially not his feelings.” He sent him a meaningful glance at the end. 

Again, Daehwi sighed helplessly. “I’m just-... I don’t know, I guess-...” 

As he kept faltering with his words, Zhenting nodded slowly, as if he understood exactly what Daehwi was trying to say even if no real words left his mouth. “Let’s talk facts”, he said then. “No jokes this time, I promise.” 

Daehwi nodded faintly. 

“Woojin left. He gave a flimsy excuse. You wanted him to stay.” Zhengting waited for Daehwi’s confirmation after every sentence. Now he leaned forward slightly. “Why did you want him to stay?” 

“I enjoy spending time with him” Daehwi replied truthfully. 

“Why?” 

It was a question way more loaded than its one syllable made it out to be. 

“It’s easy to be around him. He makes me laugh and he laughs with me and… we just get each other, you know? He always makes me feel like he wants to be around me too”, his voice was timid, slow, because he really wanted to answer truthfully but it was hard to put everything that was swirling around his head into words. He clicked his tongue. “If he isn’t running away suddenly”, he added. 

Zhengting nodded. It was astounding, Daehwi thought, that he seemed to understand exactly what Daehwi was saying and where he was going with it even though Daehwi himself was so confused about it. 

“And how long have you felt like this around him?” 

“Always.” Daehwi immediately gave back, then actually thought about it. “I mean, at first it was different, I didn’t really know him. But when we actually started talking to each other it just felt… right, you know?” 

And apparently Zhengting knew, because he smiled. “It’s obvious when you talk to each other.” 

Daehwi lowered his eyes to the table and mumbled: “I didn’t think I was being so obvious about it.” He could feel the blush creep onto his cheeks. 

“It’s not you.” Zhengting objected. “It’s the both of you. The way you talk to each other. Look at each other.” He was still smiling when Daehwi looked up at him again. “I think it ‘feels right’ for both of you”, he concluded. 

Daehwi wasn’t stupid. He knew that Woojin liked hanging out with him and he knew that Woojin must have noticed how easy they could talk to each other. He knew that Woojin liked being friends with him. If he would ask him about this he would definitely agree that it “felt right”, he just wasn’t feeling the same as Daehwi. 

“And that’s okay”, Daehwi added after he explained as much to Zhengting. “I’m fine with being friends with him if it means I can still spend time with him.” 

“Are you, really?” 

The look on Zhengting’s face gave away that he knew the answer, but Daehwi was still not ready to let him have this so easily. 

“Yeah, like I said, I love just spending time with him like thi-” 

“Then why are you so worked up over him ditching you today?” 

It was not an accusation. Zhengting’s voice was soft and Daehwi knew that he couldn’t change the older’s mind. And maybe he would be lying to himself if he denied it. The fact that he didn’t know why Woojin had actually left still sat wrong in his stomach but the thought of confronting him about it even more so. 

He wouldn’t risk to lose what it was that they had right now, not by confrontation and not by letting Woojin know what he actually felt. 

“I just don’t want to lose this”, he quietly told Zhengting, and Zhengting nodded. He reached over the table and squeezed Daehwi’s hand shortly. “It’s gonna be okay”, he said. 

He sounded so sure when he said it that Daehwi managed to hold on to that certainty and smile back. 

He would have liked to thank Zhengting for listening and understanding, but in that moment Hyungseob came back from the back, his phone in hand and loudly lamenting over a text he apparently had just received. Zhengting squeezed Daehwi’s hand once more before getting up. 

“I really have to get going”, he announced. “Why don’t you tell Daehwi about that outrageous text, Seobbie? I’m sure he’s very interested.” 

He smiled at Daehwi once more before leaving him to deal with Hyungseob. The latter had already settled in the once again vacant seat across from Daehwi and was talking a mile a minute. 

“So Jihoon just texted me about prom and how he’s upset that they’re not letting him plan it on his own, which really isn't surprising at all, he’s been complaining about that for months but now. He’s also complaining about how he has no idea how to ask someone to prom! And he won’t tell me who he wants to ask, Daehwi! He’s not even giving me hints can you believe that?!” 

Daehwi decided that discussing this would be a great chance to distract himself. 

“Unbelievable”, he humoured Hyungseob. 

“ _Right?!_ I have my theories of course, I don’t come unprepared…” 

 

______________________ 

 

Daehwi was a fairly good student and usually not particularly scared about exams and tests. The thought of his finals in senior year though had terrified him ever since freshman year. The thought came back now, as he looked at his phone where two text messages sat waiting, one from Woojin, one from Jihoon, both telling the group chat that they wouldn’t be making the movie night they had planned for the next day, because they were drowning in revision. It had to be hell, going through months and years of notes all day just to word-vomit all that knowledge onto a paper later and hope for the best, to get a different piece of paper and a handshake in return. 

He _understood_ that Woojin had a good reason to avoid him but he still felt like Woojin was doing precisely that. Avoiding him. Him specifically. Ever since the day he had suddenly left him in the café. His heart to heart with Zhengting might have given him a tiny sliver of hope, but that sliver got thinner and thinner every time he couldn’t catch Woojin during lunch break or he hurried off with another flimsy excuse when they met in the hallways. 

Maybe, he thought, there was a tiny possibility that Zhengting was right and it wasn’t him. Maybe it really was stress about his finals. Daehwi decided to hold on to that tiny possibility and he didn’t let go of it until Woojin’s sister let him into the house later that day after school. 

“Woojin’s in his room”, she informed him. “I don’t think he’s left it once in the last week except for school”, she added then. “Maybe he’ll listen if you’ll tell him it won’t kill him to take a break.” 

Daehwi certainly hoped so. 

When he tentatively knocked on Woojin’s door he heard a small thud on the other side and then a muffled “Yeah?” 

Opening the door he was met with a battlefield. Woojin’s room was usually fairly clean and surprisingly organised, but right now it looked anything but those things. The floor was littered in notebooks, textbooks and sheets of paper, Woojin’s desk held what looked like the contents of three different pencil cases as well as several snack-wrappers and energy drink cans. Woojin was sitting on a small paper free patch in front of his bed and looked at Daehwi in open surprise. 

“What are you doing here?” It sounded more confused than harsh, which was definitely a relief. 

“I haven’t really seen you around a lot in the last time” Daehwi started. “And I guessed you were really busy with studying and stuff-” 

“I am.” Woojin confirmed, chancing a desperate look at the notes scattered around him. 

Daehwi nodded. “So I thought I’d drop by quickly, bring you some chocolate and, I don’t know, maybe chat a bit? Yerim said you haven’t really taken a break from studying…” He trailed off in the end, partially because he didn’t really know what exactly he had come here for, but also because a tiny smile had made its way onto Woojin’s face and it was distracting. 

“Sounds nice” Woojin said and then scrambled to his feet. “Sorry for all the chaos, it’s terrible.” 

He kicked a few papers away from the ground so he could walk to his desk and sat down some textbooks there. It didn’t even make a small dent in the chaos and he seemed to realize it because after another look around he sighed and gestured for Daehwi to sit on the bed. “Just ignore it.” 

Daehwi chuckled and carefully perched on the edge of Woojin’s mattress because the bed was full with notes too and he didn’t want to accidentally crumple something important. Woojin didn’t seem to care about that minor detail as he let himself drop back on his bed with a huff. “This is killing me.” 

“Here”, Daehwi said and held out a chocolate bar to him. “This is anti-death chocolate.” 

“That seems like a scientific breakthrough. I can’t believe chocolate-makers of all people cracked the code.” Woojin mused as he took the bar. He looked at the wrapper for a second then at Daehwi. 

Daehwi felt his cheeks warm up. “You like that one, right? You told me about it once…” 

“I can’t believe you remembered that.” Woojin said, then smiled a tiny smile. “You’re the best.” 

Daehwi’s chest felt as warm as his head was confused. They hadn’t really had a chance to talk after the afternoon at the café and Woojin had been avoiding him all week. Daehwi had honestly started to worry that he had done, said something wrong, that Woojin was mad at him, was trying to distance himself. But now Woojin seemed completely back to normal. Sure, he looked tired and so did the smile he gave Daehwi but it was still a real smile and he joked around with him and it was just overall so normal for them that Daehwi wondered if he had maybe just read way too much into the situation. He tended to do that, it wouldn’t be a surprise. 

Woojin’s phone alerted him of a text message and as soon as he read it he laughed. “No way.” 

“What’s up?” Daehwi shook his head slightly to get rid of the lingering thoughts in his head. 

“Jihoon actually did it! Me and Sohye had a bet about this and I decided to take a chance and believe in the idiot but I didn’t actually think he would go through with it.” 

Daehwi had no idea what was going on and his face must have betrayed as much because Woojin laughed again and turned his screen for him to see. 

“Jihoon asked Jinyoung to prom.” 

His phone showed mostly incoherent keyboard smashes and strings of emojis that Jihoon had sent in the last 2 minutes. Daehwi smiled. “Thank god”, he chuckled. “Jinyoung was beginning to make plans to ask him instead, that would have been a mess.” 

Woojin grinned as he pocketed his phone again. Daehwi thought he probably shouldn’t be ignoring Jihoon right now but possibly Sohye would take on damage control. Hopefully. 

Hopefully Somi and Guanlin did the same for Jinyoung, Daehwi didn’t even dare to check his texts. 

“I’m glad that’s out of the way”, he smiled. “Now we can all go as a group and make fun of them for being there _together_ instead of awkwardly having to spend the evening with them skirting around the fact that they should be there together.” 

“We’ll all go?” 

When Daehwi looked at Woojin again the proud smile from before was gone. He suddenly looked as tired as he probably was. His expression reminded Daehwi a lot of pale clouds right before a storm. 

“Yeah, of course”, he confirmed, pretending he didn’t notice Woojin’s sudden change in mood. Maybe he just really needed a distraction from all the stress. 

Woojin stayed quiet at that and Daehwi raked his mind for what he could have questioned about his statement. 

“You _do_ plan to attend your own prom, right?”, he asked, just to make sure. Woojin had told him a while ago that he didn’t like parties much and that he apparently found them worse when they were for an official occasion. He guessed prom and all senior celebration held at school checked that last box to some degree. 

“I do”, Woojin said nonetheless. “I just didn’t think we’d all be going together.” 

“Who did you plan on going with then?” Daehwi asked again, in slight disbelief this time. As far as he knew no one in their immediate friend group had anyone to spontaneously ask to prom, now that Jihoon and Jinyoung had gotten their shit together. 

“I didn’t think you’d care.” 

It wasn’t meant as an answer. It probably hadn’t even been meant for Daehwi to hear, it had been so quiet. Maybe he hadn’t even meant to say it out loud. But he had and Daehwi had heard and it stung. Why would Woojin think so? Why didn’t he know how much Daehwi cared, especially for him? 

_How should he know? You can’t gather the guts to tell him._

Louder this time Woojin said: “I don’t know but I thought _you_ would prefer to go with someone else.” This was his actual answer, clearly, but Daehwi couldn’t shake off what he had caught before. Before he could ask more questions, Woojin shrugged half-heartedly and added: “Samuel, for example.” 

Daehwi wanted to ignore his actual answer, wanted to tell him right there and then how much he cared for him, how much it hurt him that Woojin thought otherwise, wanted to demand what he had to do to change Woojin’s thoughts- but he didn’t. Instead he replied to the second statement, his voice slightly shaking with emotion about the first: “Even if I did, why would that keep me from hanging out with you guys?” 

Samuel would surely have been there with them anyways, Daehwi didn’t even think he would’ve had to ask him to accompany all of them. After the Bonfire and the time the others had spent at the diner afterwards he seemed to have grown accustomed to all of their antics. Infact, Samuel had been with the other Juniors a lot over the last two weeks. Daehwi had just automatically assumed him as part of the ‘we’. 

Woojin apparently didn’t, or maybe he did but there was far more to it that Daehwi couldn’t decipher when he met Woojin’s eyes again and suddenly they were cold. The tiredness in them had shifted into something else when he quietly gave back: “Why wouldn’t it?” 

The words had a bite to it that Daehwi could neither place nor explain. He realised that something probably went horribly wrong in their conversation before that but he couldn’t tell what. He realised that Woojin was upset, was angry about something but he didn’t know how to fix it, if it was his fault, how to apologise if it was. 

“I-...uhm.” he stumbled over his words. “I...don’t know.” Because he really, really didn’t right now. 

“Yeah. You don’t know.” Woojin muttered again, just as quietly as the first time but now Daehwi couldn’t ignore it. 

“What do you mean?” 

“Nothing.” Woojin immediately snapped. 

Woojin had never snapped at him. Daehwi had never seen him truly angry, mildly annoyed maybe, but not to the extent that he lashed out at someone. He didn’t know how to deal with it. 

“You should leave, I really have a lot to do.” Woojin’s voice was still just as hard as before, and Daehwi’s confusion laced with something else.

He didn’t know what was going on or what he did to upset Woojin and he wish he could undo it somehow. But also he couldn’t attempt to do that, if Woojin didn’t tell him what was going on. And Woojin didn’t seem willing to tell him anything right now, even if Daehwi was willing to listen. 

How could he blame Daehwi for not knowing when he wasn’t talking to him? 

“You can’t tell me I don’t care and then block me out when I do. If I don’t know things and that bothers you, then tell me.” 

He wished the emotions would have kept out of his words, but they hadn’t, and it made them sound raw and clipped at all the wrong places and this felt too much like a fight. 

Maybe it was, the uneasy swirling in his gut told him. Daehwi just didn’t understand how it had come to this. 

Woojin wasn’t looking at him anymore, his eyes were focused on his hands fiddling with the hem of his shirt. “Just leave”, he repeated, his voice quieter this time, but just as hard. 

Daehwi looked at him for a few more, tense moments, trying to will him to look up, look at Daehwi and tell him what was wrong, talk to him, but Woojin’s eyes stayed on his hands, his fingers kept moving restlessly, the uneasiness in Daehwi's stomach roared. He felt like yelling at Woojin to talk to him, wanted to tell him how desperate he was to get this right, wanted to grab onto his fingers, halt their movement, halt the chaos in his stomach, tell Woojin how much he cared. 

He got up and left. 

 

 

 

Woojin 

He didn’t know for how long he just sat there slumped back against his pillow after he’d heard the front door fall shut behind Daehwi. It could have been only a few minutes, it could’ve been an hour, it could’ve been the whole afternoon, he couldn’t tell. The endless chorus of _You fucked up, you fucked up, you fucked up_ in his mind blurred his perception of time. 

The first other thing that registered with him was a short knock on his door. He didn’t answer, but his sister came in anyways. She hovered in the door frame for a moment, as if she was assessing the scene in front of her. Her tone was wary when she asked: “What happened?” 

Woojin wasn’t sure if he wanted to talk to her about this. He wasn’t even sure if she was talking about what happened with Daehwi or maybe about general happenings. He hoped it was the latter. 

In the time it took him to gather his thoughts, Yerim had made her way over to his bed and carefully perched on the mattress beside him. 

“Daehwi was kind of weird when he left and he was barely here for half an hour and you’ve been sitting here forever now.” She added after more of his silence. Apparently it’s been more than a few minutes since Daehwi had left. 

“I…” His voice sounded off, rough, not like his own. He cleared his throat. “Nothing happened.” 

Yerim scoffed. She had the ability to tell when Woojin was lying, which wasn’t really much of an ability at all because he was a terrible liar. “Yeah right.” She shook her head. “You can talk to me, you know?” 

“Maybe I don’t want to talk to you.” Woojin suddenly felt really tired. 

“That’s fine. I didn’t say you had to, I just said that if you want to, you can.” Yerim’s voice was as calm as her presence as she sat in silence for a short while, waiting for him to talk to her or not. 

Woojin had ways thought Yerim was way too collected when it counted. They were polar opposites in that aspect. While Woojin started losing his shit precisely at the moment it started to become important to keep it, Yerim seemed to be at her calmest then. It made her a wonderful person to go to for advice, and even though it sometimes hurt Woojin’s pride that a 13-year-old had to help him with his problems, he trusted his sister with them. 

He started wringing his hands before he spoke up, quietly. “I think I messed up.” 

“With Daehwi?” 

He nodded. 

“That’s pretty unlikely.”, she chanced. When Woojin kept his eyes on his hands, she added: “What did you do?” 

“Said things I didn’t mean, can’t deal with my own thoughts and feelings, didn’t think before I talked.” He shrugged half-heartedly. “The usual.” 

It was quiet for tad bit too long. Woojin could feel Yerim’s eyes on him like she was trying to look into his head and get all the answers she wanted without having to ask and deal with Woojin’s cryptic mess. Maybe it worked. After what felt like a small eternity, she spoke up again. 

“Woojin, don’t lie to me, okay?” 

He nodded. Maybe she knew what she was doing. Maybe she had found something in his head that he hadn’t stumbled upon yet. 

“You’re pretty stressed over finals, right?” 

Instinctively looking around at all the notes and books around them, Woojin sighed. “How could you tell?” 

He’d tried for sarcasm, but what came out sounded more like desperation. 

Yerim nodded. “It’s normal to be stressed over this, these are important and a lot of work”, she stated. “But you’ve really been working yourself up over this for days now. I barely see you anymore and I live in the room next to yours.” 

It hadn’t been another question for him to confirm, but he nodded nonetheless. “I just really don’t want to mess up.” 

“If it means anything, I don’t think you’re going to.” Yerim said with a tiny reassuring smile. She dropped it after a second though and went back to business. “So you’re stressed about school. But there’s something else, right?” 

Woojin could have just lied and denied it. He could’ve blamed school and studying on everything and promise Yerim he’d be fine on his own and be done with it. But she would have seen right through it and if he was honest with himself he needed her help so he kept putting his hope into her maybe knowing something he didn’t. He nodded. 

“Daehwi…”, he started and apparently that confirmed something for her because she nodded, as if things were starting to make sense. Which was ridiculous. Nothing made sense. 

“You like him.” She said. It was no question. She had said it so easily that it nearly made Woojin angry. He had taken weeks to come to that conclusion and it still wasn’t easy on him, and here his sister was, had no idea about anything and tried to tell him about his life. 

_That’s why you’re talking to her_ , he reminded himself. _Because she knows more about your life and how to deal with it than you and you need her help._

“I do.” His voice was tiny. 

The little spark of surprise on her face when he didn’t deny anything was only a small consolation for his pride. She caught herself again and nodded. 

“So what did you mess up?” She cut straight to the chase. Woojin couldn’t blame her, it had to be excruciating to dig for each and every answer from him, but he still had hoped for a little more guidance through this story on her part. 

It didn’t look like he was getting that guidance though, so he just started talking. 

By the end of it, Yerim was left to sort through the jumbled mess of words and feelings Woojin had just dumped on her and it took her a few moments. 

“So basically”, she started to recap. “You try to be okay with him being with Samuel but you’re not really okay but you’re pretending to be and it’s hard on you and also there’s the whole thing with finals and you snapped at him because of it and now you don’t know how to fix it?” 

He thought about it, then nodded. “I really want to fix this.”, he added. 

Yerim gathered her thoughts for another quiet few minutes. 

“You said that you know that he cares for you.”, she started. Woojin didn’t dare to interrupt her and just nodded. “But how much do you know about how he feels?” 

“What do you mean?” 

“I mean… Look, Daehwi’s been around a few times during the last weeks and I couldn’t quite place it before but…” She seemed not to be sure how to put it. “How much do you know he cares for you?” 

It was a weird question, but he decided to just roll with it. “I...We’re friends?” He hadn't intended to make it sound like a question. Of course they were friends. _If you didn’t fuck that up earlier…_

“Are you sure about that?” Either Yerim had a very intricate scheme to help him or she was just out to fuel his deepest worries. 

“What?” 

“Are you sure that you’re friends? _Just_ friends?” 

“I think I would’ve noticed other develop-” 

“Listen, I’m just saying sometimes he has this look in his eyes when he’s around you and just-” She gestured around vaguely to support her point, then sighed. “On a scale from 1 to 10 how certain are you that he doesn’t like you back?” 

“Uh...12?” Woojin immediately shot back. “He’s with Samuel.” 

“Are you sure he is?” 

“They… they went to the Bonfire together and-” 

“And afterwards you haven’t heard about them going on another date, did you?” 

“Well, no, but-” 

“But you couldn’t have, because you avoided Daehwi ever since you ran from him.” 

“...Yes.” 

Exasperatedly she slipped out her phone and typed away at it for a few minutes, ignoring Woojin’s questions and shushing his attempts to reason with her. 

Maybe she was fed up with him now. She had realised her brother was a lost cause, not to be saved from drowning in the sea of feelings and thoughts he had explained to her. He just wished she would leave his room if that was the case, so he could wallow in self-pity some more. 

Suddenly, she let out a small triumphant noise and turned her screen so Woojin could see it. 

 

 _From: Yerim_

Hey quick question, I picked up some gossip… 

 

 _From: Sohye_

I’m all ears :o 

 

 _From: Yerim_

Is Daehwi dating that Samuel dude from his grade? 

 

 _From: Sohye_

lmao no they’re just friends 

_From: Sohye_

like they went on one date but yeah they’re just friends now 

_From: Sohye_

where did you pick that up??? 

 

 _From: Yerim_

I don’t remember, just wanted to know if it was true!! thanks xx 

 

“So, getting down to it”, Yerim explained after Woojin was still staring at her phone screen. “You were stressed about nothing.” 

“I mean, I’m still stressed about my unrequited feelings. That’s a real thing that exists.” Woojin was still not fully done comprehending the situation but still tried to defend himself. “And… And school exists!” 

“Honestly? I don’t think your feelings are unrequited. I just think you’re stupid.” It didn’t sound like an insult, just a fact. “Both of you, for that matter.” 

She didn’t give Woojin a chance to ask questions or make more excuses. 

“We both know there’s only one way to find out, you gotta man up and tell him. And you really have to, I don’t wanna have you sit around and mope for much longer like some white teenage girl in a chick-flick. I’m serious you’re only missing sad background music and a huge pack of ice cream. But-” She held up a hand and gestured around the room. “You’re right. School exists. Your finals exist. And you’re not gifted with the ability to multitask.” 

Woojin knew she meant well but when he saw the small mischievous glint in her eyes when she continued it was all he could do to not physically kick her out of his room immediately. 

“The way I see it, you’re either graduating or getting some, not both at once. So you need to focus on your finals until they’re over and on your romantic teen angst after that.” 

“Wow, okay, let’s never talk about this again.” Woojin could feel his cheeks heating up. 

Yerim laughed, then patted his head affectionately. “I’m sure it’ll all work out. You’ll be fine.” 

And with that, she got up and made her way through the mess of papers and out of the door. 

Woojin wasn’t sure how she did it or whether he believed anything she had said, but Yerim had somehow managed to ease the knot in his stomach. Of course it was still there, painfully stinging whenever he remembered the look on Daehwi’s face when he had left, but now Woojin had hope that he could fix it. 

Maybe hope for more than that. 

 

______________ 

“Freedom!” 

“Seob, you do realize that we still have to go to school even if our finals are ove-” 

“ _Freedom!_ ” 

“ _Alright!_ ” Jihoon shook his head but laughed, as he left Hyungseob to his small victory dance and turned to Woojin. 

“I can’t believe it’s really over.”, he smiled. 

Sohye nodded. “We spent all this time cramming things into our heads and now it’s just out there and we don’t have to deal with it anymore”, she said, seemingly in awe. 

“Theoretically we do still have to deal with it” Doyeon piped up from behind them. 

“But only after we get back out grades and prom is before that so we have to deal with that first!” Yoojung interrupted her. Doyeon rolled her eyes with a smile, then humoured her girlfriend and picked up the subject. 

“Do you guys all have dates for prom?”, she asked. 

Hyungseob took it upon himself to answer for all of them. “I’m taking Woong, obviously. Jihoon actually got up and asked Bae Jinyoung so that’s happening, Sohye rejected a few poor boys who really aren’t up to date with this school’s bachelor market and instead chose to start her life as a gay crazy old cat lady early and go to prom on her own and Woojin’s just a loser so he’s going alone too. They’re lone wolves. _awoooh_!”

That wasn’t necessarily true, he had gotten a handful of invitations to prom, but had turned all of them down out of various reasons. Hyungseob knew that, of course, but Woojin was still glad he wasn’t proclaiming it right now. 

“Lone wolf, huh?” Yoojung bumped her elbow into his side and giggled. “Well I’m sure all of you will have a great night either way. Me and this beautiful lady right here have to go grab celebratory overpriced cupcakes from the store now, so if you’ll excuse us…” She grabbed Doyeon’s hand and pulled her away, loudly lamenting over the cupcakes she wanted. 

“You know”, Hyungseob chirped up. “I still think you should have just asked Daehwi.” 

Hyungseob didn’t know about the crush Woojin harboured in detail, like Sohye and Jihoon did and he had told none of them about his and Daehwi’s little fall-out the week before. They would have attempted to help him and mediate and they would have worried and Woojin didn’t want them to. For the first time maybe in his entire life he had a realistic hope that he could fix what he fucked up on his own. 

So he only just laughed politely at Hyungseob’s jab. Maybe everything would pan out. 

 

___________________ 

He couldn’t call what he had a plan, but it was _something_ and that something had to take place on Saturday, after the last soccer game of his high school career, because he hadn’t managed to gather the guts for it before that. 

A tiny part of him had hoped that Daehwi would be there, like he usually was, waiting for him in front of the court after the game. But he wasn’t, and even though Woojin felt a small sting at that, he wasn’t surprised. 

_This is your own fault._

He avoided all of his teammates on his way over the parking lot. Sentimental goodbyes could wait until after he fixed things with Daehwi, he was a man on a mission here and not up for hugs, not even Donghan’s.

The sky turned a heavy shade of grey on his way to the diner and he faintly regretted not taking an umbrella while he stepped through the door. 

He was greeted by all three staff members of the Saturday evening shift gathered in the front of the shop, leaning over one of the tables. As they looked up upon his arrival, Woojin saw a multitude of colour samples spread out on the table, some of them scattered on the floor beneath it. He assumed Jisung and Sungwoon were going through with their wall-painting-plan finally, but he didn’t get a chance to ask, because Sungwoon spoke up before he could. 

“Why are you alone?” 

There was no judgement behind it, just honest confusion. 

“Daehwi couldn’t make it.” He was really not up to explain anything more detailed than that right now. He had somewhere to be. Apologies to make. 

“Okay, what about literally all your other friends?” Jisung inquired. Woojin wished any of them were up for doing their actual job and taking his order for once. 

Again, Sungwoon was faster than him. “I think Saturdays are now an exclusive Woojin-and-Daehwi-thing, if you know what I mean.” He suggestively wiggled his eyebrows at Jisung. 

“Oh stop it, they were here on their own once or twice, you’re reading too much into it”, Daniel chimed in, then scrunched his eyebrows and looked at Woojin. “Or isn’t he?” 

“Um” Woojin intelligently gave back. “I’m kind of in a hurry…” 

“He is avoiding the question…” Sungwoon put a hand on his chin and narrowed his eyes at him. 

“He isn’t, he’d just really like to order.” Woojin tried again, a slight desperation sneaking into his voice. 

“Oh, he definitely has something to hide.” Jisung joined in. Woojin was tempted to just leave out the first step of his plan that wasn’t really one, turn on his heel and leave.

“Let him live guys”, Daniel interrupted the other two and stepped closer towards Woojin. “Just ignore them, I’m the only professional person here anyways.” 

When he stood in front of Woojin and Woojin expected him to ask him for his order or do literally anything productive though, he lowered his voice and added: “You know you can talk to me about this though, right? I’m great with keeping secre-” 

With an exasperated sigh, Woojin interrupted him. “Listen, guys. I fucked something up and I would like to fix it as soon as possible so if anyone here could just make me that milkshake abomination Daehwi usually orders within the next 10 minutes that would be amazing.” 

All three of them looked at him for a few seconds, before Jisung spoke up again. “One Fairy Drizzle with extra apology coming right up”, he chirped and disappeared into the back. 

“Do you need anything else? Cookies? Daehwi likes cookies.” Sungwoon asked, while he was already hurrying behind the counter and taking out the biggest cookie jar Woojin had ever seen in his life. 

“I don’t think that’s-”, he started but was interrupted by Daniel. 

“You can never go wrong with cookies, buddy”, he said while taking the paper bag of cookies Sungwoon had packed and placing them into Woojin’s unexpectant hands. He clasped a hand onto his shoulder afterwards. “I don’t know what you did but you better fix it, Daehwi doesn’t deserve this.” 

“I know.” Woojin muttered. 

Jisung reemerged from the kitchen, milkshake in his hand and concern on his face. “Don’t fuck up more, okay?” 

“I’ll try my best”, Woojin said with slight sarcasm making its way in, but Sungwoon chose to ignore it when he sweeped in and pushed him towards the exit. 

“C’mon, hurry up, it’s getting late. You don’t have all day. And you better come back and tell us about everything once this is sorted out.” 

He had him out the door before Woojin could protest. Or pay, for that matter. 

 

 

Daehwi 

He had planned to do absolutely nothing all weekend. School was nearly out for summer, no teacher was up to grade much homework anymore and the deadline for all assignments and projects had been two weeks ago already, so school definitely allowed a few days to slack. 

His friends were a different story. Jinyoung had threatened to show up at his doorstep this morning and physically drag him to the soccer game before Daehwi had decided to lie and say he was sick. He then had to lie some more and pretend that his mother wasn’t on a trip for work until later that night and in fact there to take care of him and _No, Jinyoung, you really don’t need to come here and bring soup, I’ll be okay._

He felt kind of bad for blocking Jinyoung out like this, for blocking everyone out like this in the last week. He just felt like if he spent too much time with his friends they would ultimately realize that he was upset and then he would have to tell them why and he didn’t even really know himself why. Meaning he did know that he was upset because of the whole _situation_ him and Woojin had left off on but he had no idea how that situation even came to be and even less about how to move on from here. He hadn’t really talked to Woojin all week. If he was honest he was scared that they would maybe just never really talk again. 

That was dumb, he knew that. Their friend-groups were basically merged by this point, they couldn’t avoid each other forever. But Daehwi worried that all of their conversations and interactions from now on would be doomed to be awkward and uncomfortable because whatever happened would be there, looming, and they’d never talk about it. 

He didn’t know how to deal with the possibility if this, so he did the logical thing and elected to ignore it until it would eventually punch him square in the face. 

This weekend was dedicated to ignorance and ignorance came in the form of ‘Easy A’ on his laptop screen and no lights turned on in his room except for the millions of fairylights and a very soft blanket wrapped around him. 

It was about 7 when he settled on his bed, blanket ready to be wrapped in on his lap, movie ready to be played on his screen, when he realized that if this had been a normal Saturday he would be sitting in the diner right now. He lingered on the thought despite better judgement. 

It had started raining about 20 minutes ago and by now Woojin would probably be complaining about having to wait for the bus in the rain and about his gear getting soaked. Jisung or Sungwoon or Daniel would have laughed at him but any of them would have also forced him to take one of the spare umbrellas with him once he left because Woojin never brought his own. 

Daehwi sighed quietly to himself and shook his head. Now was really not the time. 

He was just about to finally start ignoring things, when the doorbell interrupted him. He really hoped it wasn’t Jinyoung. He couldn’t lie about being sick to Jinyoung’s face, and even if he somehow managed that, his mom wasn’t here like he said and Jinyoung wouldn’t leave him alone and there would just be a lot of questions Daehwi wouldn’t want to answer. For a moment he thought about ignoring the doorbell, but then it rang again and he kind of got the impression that it was urgent. 

It wasn’t Jinyoung on the other side of the door. 

“You’re soaked.” Was Daehwi’s first reaction after he had taken in Woojin in front of him. His hair was plastered to his forehead and his jacket was dark with the water it had soaked up. 

Woojin ignored the statement and pulled the hand he had stuffed in the inside of his jacket our carefully. He was holding a paper bag and a paper cup, both with the logo of Jisung’s diner on it. Just as carefully, he held both out to Daehwi. 

“I made sure they wouldn’t get wet.” He quietly said after Daehwi had taken both things, kind of feeling dazed. Woojin’s hand pulled back after that and rested on the back of his neck instead. “I… I just wanted to say that I’m sorry.” 

He wasn’t looking at Daehwi when he continued: “I was really out of it last week because… because of school and other things and I- That doesn’t excuse snapping at you of course, you didn’t do anything wrong. You really didn’t. And I just wanted to tell you that I’m not mad at you or anything, I’m just sorry. But I totally get that you’re mad at me and you have every right to, so I just wanted to say…” 

Woojin’s eyes finally met Daehwi’s now and he repeated: “I’m sorry. I was a dick and I hope I didn’t make things weird or anything.” 

Still in a daze, Daehwi slowly looked from Woojin to the food in his hands (his favourite milkshake and a bag of Sungwoon’s special cookies that weren’t actually for sale at the diner) and back and then shook his head. “You didn’t”, he said softly. “It’s okay.” 

He hadn’t thought it was okay just an hour ago, or the whole past week. His pride had told him that Woojin had explaining to do and that Woojin _should_ be sorry and that Daehwi had every right to be and stay mad at him for pushing him away like this. His pride was very quiet now, as Daehwi’s heart spoke up and left no trace of pride or a grudge. It started beating painfully while he looked at Woojin in front of him because Woojin was soaked and looked just as upset about everything as Daehwi felt and so very genuinely sorry. 

Daehwi hadn’t planned to forgive him just like that but even if he wanted to stay strong, he felt that he already had. 

It had been quiet for a few seconds of them just looking for each other, when Woojin spoke up again. “I’ll just… leave then. I… have a nice night. I’m sorry. I’ll see you aro-” 

Daehwi cut him off. “No.” 

“...No?” Woojin looked lost. 

“You’re soaked.” Daehwi said, for the second time, then quickly added: “It’s still raining. You can just stay here until it stops. Warm yourself up.” He coughed awkwardly. “You’ll get sick otherwise.” 

Woojin still looked lost. “I can really just leave, it’s-” 

Daehwi cut him off again, vehemently shaking his head. “Come on”, he urged, gesturing for Woojin to follow him inside. 

When Woojin still stayed where he was Daehwi looked him in the eyes with as much determination as he could muster and said: “I’m not mad at you.” 

_I can’t be, even though I maybe should._

“Alright”, Woojin more breathed than said and finally followed Daehwi. 

The air between them was tense. Daehwi wished that his mom was home, she had a talent for brushing over tension and silence like they weren’t there, for making people comfortable. 

Daehwi quickly set down the food Woojin had brought on his bedroom table, then went to sort through his closet until he found a hoodie and sweatpants that were big on him and probably wouldn’t be way too small on Woojin. 

Woojin was still standing in the hallway, still looking lost. Daehwi ignored the urge to wrap him in his arms and assure him that they were okay, that he was okay. Instead he held out the clothes for him and gestured in the direction of the bathroom. “You should go and take a hot shower, you’ll really get sick otherwise.” 

Woojin looked from the bundle of clothes in his hands to his face and his expression was way too serious when he opened his mouth. “I…” 

Daehwi shook his head. He hated the weird atmosphere between them. “C’mon, hurry up”, he tried for a joking tone. “You’re flooding the entire hallway, my mom will have both our heads when she comes home later.” 

A tiny smile made its way onto Woojin’s face. It was directed at the floor, not Daehwi, but it still made the air around them feel more like it usually did, more comfortable, easier. 

“Okay”, Woojin agreed softly and took the clothes from Daehwi, disappearing into the bathroom. 

As the door closed behind him, Daehwi released a small sigh. He realized then how glad he actually was that Woojin showed up and how scared he had been before about what would happen to them. The thought that they would possibly go back to normal made his heart feel at ease in a way that it hadn’t felt for a week now. 

_You’re ridiculous_ , he told himself as he settled on his bed to wait for Woojin to come back. _It’s ridiculous that you depend on him so much._

And it was, but Daehwi didn’t know what to do about it. When Woojin came back and Daehwi’s baggy sweater was still baggy on him, surprisingly, and his hair was still damp and fell into his eyes and his cheeks were faintly pink with warmth, Daehwi thought that maybe it was okay that he didn’t know what to do about it. 

“How was the game?” he asked. He decided that just acting as if everything was normal would bring back their normality. 

Woojin carefully climbed onto the bed next to him and leaned back against the pillows Daehwi had piled against the wall. “Good. We won.” He thought for a moment. “I’m glad we did, it would’ve been weird to not leave on a high note.” 

“It was your last game?” Daehwi asked. Then realized how stupid the question was. “Wait, of course it is. Prom is next week, there’s no other games. I’m sorry.” 

“You don’t have to be. It was fine, I mostly bolted from the sentimental goodbyes.” Woojin gestured towards the cookies on the table. “To go and get my peace offering.” 

Daehwi smiled and grabbed the paper bag of the table. After he plopped one of the cookies into his own mouth he offered one to Woojin and as they were both silently munching away on Sungwoon’s top secret recipe masterpieces, Woojin nodded towards Daehwi’s laptop screen. 

“What were you watching?” 

“Nothing yet”, Daehwi shook his head. “I was just gonna watch the same Hollywood romcom for the 50th time and ignore life.” 

“Oh, fun. Which one?” 

“That sounds like you know more than I thought you would.” Daehwi snickered. 

“I really honestly don’t”, Woojin replied. “I’ve watched some but I always forget the names and confuse the plots. Yerim yells at me for it all the time.” 

“I was gonna watch ‘Easy A’.” 

“Is that the one with… Emma Roberts?” 

“Emma Stone.” 

“So close.” 

Daehwi laughed and took a sip from his milkshake. After a few seconds of silence (comfortable this time, thank god), Woojin nudged his arm. 

“So are we watching Emma Stone fall in love with some random white dude, or…?” 

“Do you want to?” Daehwi raised an eyebrow. Woojin shrugged and pointed at the window. 

“It’s still raining, I might as well find out what’s so easy about As.” 

“Good point.” 

He didn’t know whether it was because he had seen the movie so often, or because his mother had woken him up at 7AM this morning to bid him goodbye or because the tension that had built in his stomach over the last week was gone now, but after about half of the movie, Daehwi could feel his eyelids droop. He managed to keep himself awake by indulging the questions Woojin randomly asked about the plot (“Just watch the movie, Woojin. You’re spoiling yourself.”) but he felt his senses clouding over with sleepiness more and more. 

By the end of the movie it felt like his brain had completely detached from his mouth and his mouth in turn had developed a life of its own. 

At some point he had resigned to resting his head on Woojin’s shoulder so he felt Woojin’s words more than he heard them. “I think I’ve seen the movie with this song.” 

“Breakfast Club?” Daehwi murmured and he felt Woojin nod. “It’s good.” 

He yawned, then sighed. “Man, I wish my life was a romcom.” His words sounded slurred with sleep. 

Woojin chuckled. “Yeah?” 

“Mhm. With aaall the clichés.” 

“Like for example driving into the sunset on a lawn mower?” Woojin pointed to the screen. 

“Yeah”, Daehwi agreed and yawned again. “Or that weird dream I had a few weeks ago.” 

“Oh, now it’s getting interesting”, Woojin joked. “What dream?” 

“About you”, Daehwi replied truthfully. He felt Woojin tense up. 

“Me?” 

“Mhm. It was this whole long heartfelt confession”, he slowly elaborated. His voice felt funny as it came out of his mouth in a slur and he chuckled shortly before continuing: “Y’said I’m amazing.” 

Woojin drew in a sharp breath. It registered somewhere in Daehwi’s drowsy thoughts but he didn’t know what to make of it. 

“A-and”, Woojin swallowed before he continued to talk. “You wished that really happened?” 

Again, Daehwi hummed out a confirmation. “It was a nice dream.” 

His eyes were closed at that point so he didn’t see anything and everything was completely silent, but he still felt Woojin’s shoulder being tense beneath his cheek and he could basically hear Woojin’s brain working. 

With the sleepy fog in his brain and thoughts about the dream he’d had and Woojin and everything that happened in the last week drowsily mixing in his thoughts, he nearly missed Woojin’s low whisper. 

“It… was not a dream.” 

“Hm?” Daehwi slowly lifted his head from Woojin’s shoulder. It felt infinitely heavy. “What d’you mean?” 

Woojin turned his face to look at Daehwi. He was confusingly close when Daehwi sleepily blinked at him and his eyes sparkled with the reflection of all the fairylights in Daehwi’s room. It was disorienting. He felt like it was quiet for a tad bit too long, but he also thought it may just be his hazy brain fucking with his perception of time. 

And suddenly Woojin’s face was even closer. Daehwi blinked once, harder, to focus on Woojin’s eyes again, but before he could follow through with it and force his eyes to deal with the small distance between them there suddenly was no distance at all and Woojin’s hand was on his cheek and Woojin’s lips were on his. 

Woojin was kissing him. 

All of this registered in Daehwi’s brain way slower than it should have. Woojin’s hand and his lips were gone way quicker than he wanted them to be. Woojin looked way more shocked by his own actions than Daehwi probably did. 

“I…”, he quietly started but didn’t seem to be able to find the words. He looked like he wanted to apologize and Daehwi wanted to tell him he didn’t have to. He looked like there was a million things he wanted to say and Daehwi wanted to tell him that he would listen. His eyes looked like the night sky and Daehwi wanted to tell him how much he loved looking at them. 

What his mouth and its own sentience actually bothered to tell Woojin was: “Your eyes.” 

Woojin’s voice was barely a whisper when he asked: “What about them?” 

“They’re glittering”, Daehwi whispered back. 

And then suddenly he was giggling, laughter shaking his whole body and his head tipped forward again until he was back to leaning against Woojin and he still hadn’t stopped laughing. He laughed because what he said had been ridiculous and because he was ridiculously tired and because _they_ were ridiculous. 

“You should really sleep. You’re so tired.”, Woojin’s voice filtered through the sleepy blissful cotton that filled Daehwi’s head. He nodded weakly against Woojin’s chest and wound one of his arms around Woojin’s middle. 

He thought he wanted to say something to Woojin but he couldn’t concentrate on single thoughts in his head anymore, so he just hummed shortly, before he let himself drift off. 

__________________ 

The next morning was weird, for multiple reasons. 

For one, neither his expectations, nor Hollywood movies had ever prepared Daehwi for this morning. His expectations would have laughed at him had he only dared to imagine the occurrences of last night possible. Hollywood usually didn’t think ‘The Morning After Your Year-Long Crush Kissed You And You Fell Asleep On Him’ was something necessary to cover in their rom-coms. Daehwi had no idea how to proceed. He didn’t know what proceeding even entailed in the slightest now. Did Woojin know? Did Woojin even _want_ to proceed? 

It was also weird because this was not the first time he woke up next to Woojin and it should be a déjà-vu of sorts, but it was nothing like that. 

A loud crash from a few rooms over made both of them jump. Daehwi had sat upright immediately, sleepily blinking and trying to come to his senses while his heart thumped rapidly. 

“Mom?”, he called, his voice still thick with sleep. 

“I’m sorry!”, was the only thing he got back, then a lot of rummaging and no other explanation. 

“Are you alright?”, he tried again, and a yawn stole itself into his words halfway through. 

“I’m peachy!”, his mother yelled back. “Sorry for waking you boys up!” 

Daehwi looked next to him at Woojin who was looking in the direction that her voice came from, seemingly having not grasped the situation fully yet. 

“Did she die?”, his voice sounded just as out of use as Daehwi’s had, but Woojin could somehow pull it off way better than him, Daehwi thought. Woojin made it seem like that was what his voice was supposed to sound like. 

Daehwi shrugged. “I guess she’s okay.” 

He heard steps nearing his room from the kitchen and looked at his door expectantly. 

“Good morning!” His mother chirped as soon as she had stuck her head through the door. “Did you have a good sleep?” 

She didn’t leave them time to answer as she opened the door fully and stepped inside, leaning lightly against Daehwi’s desk. 

“I came home really late last night, you were already asleep. I didn’t know you were coming over Woojin, sweetie, I must seem like a terrible mother to you, I never have real food in the house when you’re here! I tried to make pancakes but the milk… is out of order now.” Daehwi was glad she had at least given them some sort of explanation for the noise. “Scrambled eggs sound okay, right?” 

She had directed the question at Woojin and he hurried to nod, before hesitating. “You really don’t have to make anything, I’m fine with cereal or something…” 

“Nonsense”, Daehwi’s mother objected. Then she energetically pushed off the desk, presumably to take on the task of scrambled eggs. “I’m expecting you in the kitchen for breakfast in 5 minutes and no less!”, she chirped. Daehwi hoped she wouldn’t put the eggs or the pan or herself ‘out of order’ in these 5 minutes. 

She left behind sleepy silence, which brought Daehwi back to thinking that this was weird. The air seemed tense, in a way similar to the tension right after Woojin had apologized yesterday, but it was also nothing like that. If yesterday had been the tension of an upcoming icy storm, right now was the heaviness of a warm summer rain in the distance. Yesterday, Woojin’s smile had been unsure, small, when he sat up and looked at Daehwi now it was bright and full of something warm, something that made Daehwi feel nervous. 

He didn’t get a chance to dwell on it, didn’t get a chance to say anything, because Woojin scrambled from the bed at that moment, grabbing for his clothes that he’d left over Daehwi’s chair to dry last night. 

“Thank god, they’re dry”, he cheered. “I’ll meet you and your mom and her scrambled eggs in the kitchen”, he directed at Daehwi with another grin, then disappeared through the door and into the bathroom. 

Daehwi was left alone with his thoughts. 

He figured that since Woojin was the one who kissed _him_ last night, he should probably leave whatever happened next to Woojin too. He was sure Woojin had some sort of idea about it. He wouldn’t have kissed him otherwise, right? 

Daehwi nodded to himself. His brain, prone to over-thinking, was unusual calm in the wake of last night’s events and his heart didn’t veto it when he decided that he would probably be fine with whatever Woojin would be fine with. Probably. Hopefully. 

His mother called for him from the kitchen. 

 

Woojin 

He figured that since he had been the one to kiss Daehwi last night, he should probably leave whatever happened next to Daehwi. Woojin frankly had no idea about it, he wasn’t even sure what on earth had come over him last night. 

He _had_ wanted to kiss Daehwi but he had wanted to do that multiple times before and never did it. Mostly because he was a whimp, but also because he hadn’t thought Daehwi would have wanted it. He still didn’t. 

Daehwi had told him yesterday that he had heard Woojin’s confession and that he’d thought it was a dream and that he’d wanted it to be real. But did that really mean he’d wanted to kiss Woojin? 

He leaned against the closed bathroom door and released a long breath. 

What if he had just been stupid and misinterpreted the situation terribly? They had just made up too, what if things would become awkward now again? 

“Idiot”, he hissed at himself. 

Daehwi hadn’t said anything yet. Of course his mother had kind of prevented any sort of one-on-one ‘Hey, We Kissed Last Night. What The Hell, Dude?” conversation, but Daehwi hadn’t really seemed keen to talk about it generally. 

Maybe he didn’t remember? He had been so very tired last night when Woojin had possibly misread his confession that possibly hadn’t been one, maybe he’d also believed the kiss to be a dream?  
Or maybe he wanted to pretend to not remember? That it didn’t happen? 

Maybe Daehwi just wanted to spare them the awkwardness and Woojin the let-down. 

It stung, but while putting on his clothes from the day before Woojin thought that it probably would hurt more if Daehwi would have been cold and pushed him away. He probably couldn’t have dealt with that. 

He could deal with pretending it didn’t happen if that’s what Daehwi wanted. He could deal with staying friends. 

Mrs. Lee’s voice sounded from the kitchen and he quickly finished getting dressed. Before he joined Daehwi and her in the kitchen, he took another deep breath. 

He could deal with this. 

______________________ 

“Woojin! You’re here! Quick, what’s better: 500$ for one dumb bird or 500 cool lizards for 1$ each?” 

“Uhm.” Woojin looked from Guanlin’s expectant eyes to the rest of his friends in hope for any kind of explanation. 

“He’s gonna say lizards”, was all he got when turning to Sohye. She took a bite from her sandwich with a very serious expression. 

“Okay, but Woojin. Have you ever considered how cool it would be to have a parrot. You could talk to it and be its friend” Jihoon pointed out 

“I mean… You can be friends with lizards too, I guess?” Woojin slowly set down his backpack and sat on the chair next to Jinyoung. Jinyoung seemed uninterested in lizards and parrots, it seemed like a save space. 

“Told you” Sohye grinned. 

“But _fivehundred_ of them?!” Jihoon looked at him in disbelief. 

Woojin shrugged. He still was not 100% sure why exactly they were talking about this but now he was invested. “That’s 500 friends.” 

“Are they really your friends when you have to pay for each of them?”, Jinyoung suddenly threw in. He was interested in lizards and parrots after all. 

“You’d also have to pay for the bird”, Somi pointed out. 

When Jihoon opened his mouth again, very likely to defend his non-existent pet parrot, Woojin decided to try for an actual normal subject of conversation. 

“Has anyone seen Daehwi today?” 

Jihoon clasped his mouth shut again and shook his head, Sohye did the same. This wasn’t really surprising to Woojin, he had been with the two of them all day so he knew that they didn’t know where Daehwi was any more than him. 

Somi was the first one to give him an actual helpful answer. “His mom quarantined him”, she explained. “I think he has a fever.” 

Guanlin nodded. “He’s been updating me about binge watching Tom & Jerry and I think he’s a bit high on medicine. It’s hilarious.” 

“Nah”, Jinyoung murmured. “He’s just usually like that.” 

The others laughed and Woojin laughed with them, maybe a beat too late. 

Daehwi and him had still not talked about what had happened. He had left not long after breakfast the day before and it didn’t feel appropriate to text him about it after that. Also he still felt like it would be the right thing to let Daehwi decide what to do with this situation after Woojin had more or less pushed the both of them into it without warning. He didn’t want to push more and if Daehwi hadn’t wanted to talk about it that morning or throughout the day, that was fine with Woojin. 

Of course the all too familiar knot in his stomach had made another appearance, had made him question whether he really could just pretend it didn’t happen if that’s what Daehwi wanted, but he’d ignored it to his best ability. They’d see each other at school, he’d thought and they’d hang out afterwards now that the seniors were done with their exams. They had plenty of time to talk. Daehwi had plenty of time to think, to tell him about what he thought they should do, or to do none of these things and just stay friends with Woojin. Staying friends was wonderful, they were good at that, Woojin wouldn’t want to not be friends. 

Right now, with the prospect of Daehwi not being available to talk for at least a few days sent him into a spiral of thinking that he hadn’t necessarily wanted to go down. 

Would Daehwi even want to talk about it? Woojin was pretty sure he wouldn’t shut him out completely, and he was hopeful that things wouldn’t be awkward. They hadn’t been awkward the day before. 

Maybe Daehwi just was a very good actor? 

Maybe he had been acting like nothing happened and everything was fine until he got Woojin off his back and then tried to think of ways to let him down but didn’t want to face him yet and now he wasn’t here? 

_That’s ridiculous, you self-centered idiot_ , he told himself. Daehwi was sick, he wasn’t specifically avoiding Woojin. 

They were friends and they would stay friends no matter what happened. 

Probably. 

“Woojin?” Sohye hit his arm repeatedly to get his attention. 

“Sorry, what?” 

“On what planet were you right now?”, she laughed. 

Woojin just replied with a sheepish smile and a shake of his head. His friends didn’t need to know about his unnecessary emotional turmoil. He could manage his emotions by himself. 

“I personally think this is a terrible idea and I’m convinced Woojin will agree.” Somi nodded, seemingly very convinced by whatever she was talking about. He wondered if it was still about lizards. 

“Agree to what?”, he asked, just to make sure. 

“Seriously, where have you _been_ the last five minutes?” Somi shook her head, then started recapping everything that Woojin had missed- unrealistically much for 5 minutes. 

“-So basically, and you’ll surely agree with me on this one, we should not all match our clothes for prom and that’s not at all ‘squad goals’ it would just be a disaster.” 

“You can’t ask Woojin about his opinion on fashion things to prove a point, have you _seen_ the clothes he wears?” Jihoon, as far as Woojin had gathered, was vehemently pro-matching. 

“That’s rich coming from you” Somi gave back. 

Soon enough they had fallen back into a heated discussion and Woojin was happy to actually follow along this time. It was definitely better to try and keep up with the mess that his friends sometimes were than with the mess in his head. 

_____________________ 

“What the _fuck_ , Woojin. I’m gonna come down the stairs again and this time you better dramatically gasp or something.” 

Woojin snorted. “Sohye. You and I both know that you won’t walk up the stairs in these heels again.” 

She took the last two steps downstairs and pouted at him before turning it into a glare. “I hate you.” 

“No you don’t”, he grinned. “Also you look amazing.” 

Immediately, her glare dropped in favour for a grin of her own. “I know, right?” 

“Yeah, yeah, we all cleaned up nice, we didn’t match our clothes, we’re all happy about that, can we go now?” Jihoon hurried into the hallway from the kitchen, jingling the car keys in his hands. “Not all of us are sad and alone and have nothing to expect tonight, you know?” 

Sohye rolled her eyes. “We get it, Jihoon. You have a love life and a date to prom and you’re a bundle of nerves because of it, we _get_ it.” 

“I’m not a bundle of nerves”, Jihoon muttered. When his phone dinged with a text message, he nearly let it drop because he unlocked it that fast. 

“The others are all there already”, he announced, while Sohye cleaned non-existent dust off Woojin’s tux. 

He slapped her hand away. “I can’t believe we’re late to our own prom.” 

“And whose fault is that?” Jihoon taunted. 

“Sohye’s”, Woojin shrugged. She punched his chest lightly. 

Jihoon’s phone chimed again and this time he didn’t suffer a minor heart attack from it. Looking down at the screen, he laughed. 

“They sent a selfie.” 

He turned his phone for Woojin and Sohye to see. The juniors were all gathered in front of the school’s gym, decorated with tons of balloons and lights. Somi and Guanlin were mocking one of those typical awkward prom picture poses, while Jinyoung grinned into the camera he was holding up and Daehwi stood directly behind him laughing back at the other two. 

“I’m glad Daehwi got better in time”, Sohye smiled. “It wouldn’t have felt right to not have him there.” 

Jihoon nodded enthusiastically, then turned to Woojin as if he remembered something. “He asked for you in school yesterday! You just disappeared during lunch… You saw him, right?” 

When Sohye had announced Friday morning that Daehwi was finally back from the dead and roaming the school grounds again, a peculiar kind of dread had filled Woojin’s guts. He’d thought after 5 days full of chances to make peace with every single possible outcome of his and Daehwi’s _situation_ would be enough to prepare him to actually talk to Daehwi again. But somehow right at that moment he hadn’t been able to decide which would be the worst option: Daehwi just outright telling him he didn’t feel the same? Daehwi just ignoring what had happened? Daehwi maybe avoiding him, after all? Terrifying. 

So Woojin had done the mature thing to do and had hidden from Daehwi all day. During lunch he followed some of his teammates from soccer outside instead of joining his friends in the cafeteria at their usual table. 

( Before he could sit down in the grass next to Kiwon, Donghan had jumped up and engulfed him into an enthusiastic hug. He’d rambled about how Woojin had just vanished after the last game and how he didn’t get to say goodbye, until Haknyeon had interrupted him. 

“Dude, summer doesn’t start until two weeks from now, you’ll see Woojin lots before that.” 

“Yes, but that’s not the point here”, Donghan had retorted. They had all been sitting down now but he had yet to let go of Woojin. 

“It’s symbolic”, Kiwon had backed him up. 

“Precisely! Like after our last win as a team and shit!” 

“‘And shit’”, Haknyeon had repeated. “So eloquent.” 

“Oh, shut up.” Donghan had stuck his tongue out at him and then turned to Woojin. “So what brings us to this honour, cap?” 

“Yeah, did the Avengers throw you out?” Hyunmin had chimed in, after he’d somehow managed to stuff his whole sandwich into his mouth at once. 

“First of all you’re disgusting. Second of all, it’s not the Avengers, it’s the Powerpuff Girls. Third of all no they didn’t, can’t I hang out with my dear soccer-pals for once?” Woojin had furrowed his brows. “Actually, I hang out with you a lot, I don’t know what you’re getting at here.” 

Hyunmin had gulped down the unbelievable amount of food in his mouth and grinned at him. “I know, I’m just messing with you, Buttercup.” 

“Hyunmin is in a really good mood because he got a date for prom”, Donghan had whisper-yelled into Woojin’s ear. 

“Which reminds me”, Haknyeon had shuffled closer to them so he was sitting at Woojin’s other side. “Who are you going with?” 

“Uh, no one?” 

“Doesn’t count.” 

Woojin had blinked at him. “It’s the truth?” 

“Doesn’t count”, Haknyeon had repeated. 

“Do you want me to lie to you?” 

Haknyeon had gasped. “You wouldn’t!” 

Donghan had released the casual headlock he’d had on Woojin but only to snake his arms around his middle instead. “Jihoon is going with that cute shy junior you guys have been hanging out with, right?” 

“Jinyoung”, Woojin had nodded. He’d hoped the conversation would shift from his own date-situation to Jihoon’s now. He had actual information about Jihoon’s dating situation. 

“Doesn’t Jinyoung have any cute friends you could go with?” Kiwon had asked. 

_He does_ , Woojin had thought. _I would love to do that._

Out loud he’d laughed and said: “Prom is literally tomorrow, I think that’s a bit too last-minute.”) 

“I haven’t seen him”, Woojin told Jihoon. He could basically feel the glances Jihoon and Sohye exchanged, so he added: “But I’ll see him now, right? Given we actually appear at our own prom at some point.” 

That got the other two moving. While Jihoon pushed them out in the direction of his car parked in front of the house, Sohye grinned at Woojin. 

“Daehwi’s gonna be overwhelmed if he hasn’t seen you in 6 days and now you’re looking hot like this.” 

He rolled his eyes and murmured a quiet: “Shut up.” 

Sohye and Jihoon still didn’t know about Woojin’s latest series of fuck-ups, and tonight wouldn’t be the right time to tell them. This was no night for God Woojin You’re So Stupid Let Us Help You conversations. 

Luckily the two of them dropped the subject as soon as they were on their way and started shouting along the lyrics to ‘All Star’. 

Daehwi 

“Why aren’t you nervous? Why am I more nervous than you?” Somi fussed with Jinyoung’s tie for what felt like the 10th time in the last 5 minutes. 

“I don’t see why I should be”, Jinyoung replied and pushed her hands away. “I’ve talked to Jihoon before, you know?” 

“I _know_ , but until now it never was on a date! Daehwi back me up here it’s weird that he’s not nervous, right?” 

Daehwi shrugged. “It’s understandable.” 

Somi narrowed her eyes at him. “The fever messed with your head.” 

“How about you, Daehwi? Are you nervous?” Guanlin slung an arm around his shoulders. 

“Why would I be?” 

“You know... nice music, good atmosphere, you, alone, Woojin, also alone…” Guanlin grinned and bumped their hips together as if that would explain what exactly he meant. 

It kind of did. 

“Oh, stop it”, Daehwi sighed and rolled his eyes. 

He was slightly touchy on the subject without meaning to be. He hadn’t seen or spoken a word to Woojin all week and being left alone with his thoughts for most of it had been hell. His brain had provided him with multiple options as to why exactly Woojin was ghosting on him, what exactly he’d done to make Woojin hate him, how exactly Woojin would tell him that the kiss had been a mistake and they should never talk about it or to each other ever again. 

Many times he’d grown sick of it and had been close to just texting Woojin about it or calling him, but his pride had gotten the best of him every time that his anxiety hadn’t. On one hand he was anxious to hear whatever Woojin had to say about this, on the other hand Woojin had started this and it shouldn’t have to be on Daehwi to clear it up. So he hadn’t done anything and neither had Woojin and now they had to face each other for the first time in a week with all their friends around at prom of all places. 

“Tonight is gonna be so much fun!”, Somi suddenly chirped. Daehwi was glad she’d decided to change the subject, but it subsided just as quickly as it had come because he saw said subject get out of his best friend’s car. 

“They’re here”, he announced and steeled himself for whatever would happen. Or not happen. 

______________________ 

Proms, it turned out, were generally way too busy for awkwardness. Hyungseob and Euiwoong had arrived at about the same time Woojin, Sohye and Jihoon had and suddenly there had been so many people and Hyungseob had tried to jump onto Jihoon’s back and Euiwoong had rolled his eyes and pulled Daehwi towards the gym’s entrance. The others followed close behind and soon enough they were all in the midst of the event and there was music on and people talking all over. Daehwi hadn’t even gotten a chance to look at Woojin at that point and he thought that maybe it wasn’t a bad thing. 

The gym was huge but the abundance of students in fancy clothing and all the balloons and decorations made it seem crowded. When Daehwi realized this, Euiwoong and him had reached a vacant standing table. He also realized that the way to this table had been through a rather crowded part of the gym and suddenly he recalled the last time he and Woojin had been in the same crowded area. 

He couldn’t help the worried glance he threw back at the others as his immediate reaction to the realization settling uncomfortably in his gut. The others were already pretty close to their table but Daehwi still thought it was a ridiculous coincidence when he accidentally caught Woojin’s eyes directly. They held each other's gaze for a few moments, until everyone was gathered around the table. Woojin was too far away to talk to him without the others noticing so Daehwi opted to mouth: “You okay?” and gestured to all the people around them to indicate what he meant. Woojin followed his movements and quickly nodded. Daehwi nearly didn’t catch the small reassuring smile Woojin sent him before dropping his gaze and turning to Sohye next to him. 

It had been their first conversation in a week and it hadn’t really been one but it still eased Daehwi’s heart in the slightest. It was a start. 

“Ugh, I hate this song”, Somi’s voice was suddenly right next to his ear. “Come dance with me, I lost Guanlin.” 

Daehwi turned to face her. “You lost Guanlin?” 

She just gestured around the small group around the table and shrugged. “He’s gone.” 

“It’s been five minutes!” 

“I’m not his keeper, the kid can do what he wants, Daehwi. Now come dance to this awful song with me!” 

They eventually found Guanlin again after about three equally awful songs that Somi had made him dance to. He was standing at the bar right next to the entrance, talking to Seonho. 

“Oh there you are!”, he smiled when they joined him. “You were gone right when we came in so I just stayed here, I figured one of you would have to go outside again at some point.” 

Gladly, Guanlin took over Daehwi’s duties and accompanied Somi to the next round of terrible songs on the dance floor. Daehwi left them to it and returned to the table they had all gathered at before. 

It was empty now, safe for Jihoon, Jinyoung and Sohye. The latter gave Daehwi a wide smile upon his arrival while the other two didn’t seem to be aware of his presence. 

“I’m so glad you’re here”, Sohye told him. “I’m high-key third-wheeling here and I couldn’t think of a way to politely excuse myself from the conversation.” Louder, in Jihoon and Jinyoung’s direction, she said: “Daehwi said he needs some fresh air, see you guys later!” 

Before Daehwi could protest or ask questions she had pulled him back into the direction he had come from and in front of the gym. 

Daehwi thought that this evening consisted of a lot of getting pulled around to places by his friends, but until now they hadn’t really given him any reason to complain about it. He wasn’t really in the mood to complain anyways, he was too caught up in his head. 

Sohye sighed as soon as they had left the crowd inside behind. “Man, I love Jihoon, I really do and Jinyoung is a wonderful boy but it’s exhausting being alone with them.” 

She didn’t seem to be expecting any kind of reaction to that because she immediately added: “So, how are you doing? Having fun?” 

“Do you think you have to indulge me now that you pulled me out into the cold?” 

“First of all, we’re friends, I indulge you all the time, second of all it’s the end of June and definitely not cold.” Sohye laughed. “I’m serious. How are you, are you feeling all better?” 

“Yeah, I’m- I’m good!” Daehwi didn’t know why this conversation made him nervous at first. He had talked to Sohye one on one before. 

_But when you talked to her before it wasn’t after you kissed her best friend…_ , his mind reminded him. 

“Are you sure?”, she asked. 

What if Woojin had told Sohye what happened and how he felt about it? What if Sohye was here and caring for him like this because she knew he was going to be painfully let down? 

He wanted to yell at himself to stop panicking about this, because it was ridiculous. Sohye was his friend and a caring person and he had been sick and she didn’t have any other motives than that. 

Still, he couldn’t help the words from slipping out: “Did he tell you?” 

“Did who tell me what?” The look on her face told Daehwi that his assumptions had been wrong and he already started cursing himself for having said anything at all. 

“Uhm, nothing”, he tried. Maybe an awkward laugh would brush over it. 

It didn’t. “Aw c’mon. Don’t leave me hanging like this, Daehwi! What was who supposed to tell me?” 

“Nobody was supposed to tell you anything!” Daehwi assured her. “I was just being stupid.” 

“Okay Daehwi, here’s the thing. I’m not good at being convincing but I’m very good at being annoying and I will find out what you were talking about. You might as well just tell me.” 

She looked at him very earnestly and Daehwi realized that she probably just meant well, just wanted to help, but he still didn’t feel like he should tell her. 

“It’s really nothing”, he repeated. “Don’t worry about it.” 

Sohye pursed her lips but said nothing for a few moments. Daehwi thought that maybe her words from before had just been a bluff and she would let it go, but in precisely that moment she opened her mouth again. What she said wasn’t annoying, as she’d announced, it just was annoyingly accurate. 

“Is this about Woojin?” 

It was so annoyingly accurate that Daehwi started worrying again about whether Sohye knew what happened or not. 

“What if it is?”, he tried for a vague reply. Maybe he could get a better picture on what she did and didn’t know. 

“If it is, it would be cool if you could tell me because Woojin has been weird lately.” 

“Weird?” 

She nodded. “Not ‘We Need To Immediately Intervene’ weird, me and Jihoon aren’t as worried as we’ve been at other instances of Woojin being weird”, she explained. “But he’s been kinda off. We thought it was about school, maybe, but finals are over now and it’s still like that.” 

Immediately Daehwi felt something tense up in his stomach. Woojin was caught up on, maybe upset about something and it probably had to do with Daehwi. The reasonable part of his brain told him that he shouldn’t feel bad for anything, he hadn’t done anything after all, but the rest of him still drove him to ask: “Why would I have anything to do with that?” 

He hoped that Sohye hadn’t realized yet that he never denied that all of this was about Woojin, that she wouldn’t realize it until Daehwi knew more about this. She was quiet for a tad bit too long for that hope to stay alive. 

After a sigh, she muttered: “I really shouldn’t do this…” 

It was way too quiet to be meant for Daehwi’s ears which was why he didn’t reply to it. Otherwise he would have told her that the tone of her voice made it sound like no matter what she shouldn’t be doing, she was about to do it. 

“Listen, Daehwi”, she said. “I’m only telling you this because I think my hunch about it is right and I want to help.” 

She interrupted herself for a second and another sigh. “Also I’m a terrible best friend, apparently.” 

Daehwi was too tense to interrupt her and just watched her as she seemed to think it all over again. 

“It’s prom!”, she said, and it sounded a whole lot like she was trying to convince herself of something. Daehwi would have loved to know what was going on inside her head, just to spare her the struggle. “Things like this happen during prom night, right? Drama and happy endings and romance plots get resolved. You’ve seen movies, right, Daehwi?” 

Daehwi nodded. He’s seen a lot of those movies, even if none of them had fulfilled their purpose to prepare him for the way his life was going at the moment. 

While Sohye was still hesitating, maybe looking for the right words, maybe reconsidering if she should tell him, maybe considering to never speak to him again and move to Yemen, Daehwi’s mind ran miles trying to think of what she was talking about. ‘Happy endings’ she had said and ‘romance plots’ and that this had something to do with Woojin. This probably had something to do with Daehwi too, if she shouldn’t be telling him. Or maybe it hadn’t and it just was top-secret. Maybe Sohye was gonna tell him that whatever was going on with him and Woojin, it could never go on because Woojin had killed a man and would have to flee the country soon. Maybe _Woojin_ had to move to Yemen. 

Daehwi thought that he didn’t want to be in on this story if it involved murder. He also thought that in comparison to murder, what had actually happened between him and Woojin seemed very tame. He had gathered from their situation that Sohye probably didn’t know about what had happened last weekend. Maybe it would be easier for everyone involved if he told her? Maybe it would stop her from making him basically an accomplice to murder. 

“Woojin kissed me”, he blurted out, before he could stop himself. 

“Excuse me?” Sohye raised both eyebrows and stared at him. Daehwi just stared back, silent, while his mind was screaming and throwing various profanities at his loose mouth. “He did what?”, Sohye asked again. 

“He kissed me”, Daehwi repeated, his voice faint, even though he knew she had heard him the first time. “Last weekend”, he added because he felt like he needed to explain. “After the soccer game.” 

And then, suddenly, somewhere inside him a switch was flicked and everything he had kept to himself over the last two weeks poured out. 

He told Sohye about the night of the Bonfire, about Woojin’s panic attack and how he had realized his crush was more than that. He told her about the afternoon at Zhu’s where Woojin had basically ran from him but seemed completely fine a while later when Daehwi visited him. He told Sohye about how Woojin apparently hadn’t been fine back then and how he’d snapped at Daehwi. He talked about last weekend when Woojin had apologized and he had immediately forgiven him even though he maybe shouldn't have and they’d watched a movie together and he talked about the fairylights reflecting in Woojin’s eyes after he kissed him. And finally he ended with all the uncertainty he’d felt in the last week. 

“I’m scared of what will happen now, I guess. We haven’t really talked to each other and he hasn’t told me why he did it and I feel like it’s not my place to ask.” He sighed. “I thought I’d be fine with pretending it didn’t happen and just staying friends but now… I don’t know.” 

He shrugged half-heartedly and suddenly he felt pretty pathetic. He couldn’t exactly say why, but he wouldn’t be surprised if Sohye would start laughing at him. Suddenly he thought that he maybe should have just accepted being an accomplice to murder. He didn’t dare to look up and meet her gaze. 

But Sohye didn’t laugh at him. She didn’t say anything and Daehwi nearly got to the point where he would have either laughed, changed the subject and pretended the last 5 minutes hadn’t happened or ran off and never left his room again. But Sohye put an end to all of these thought processes when she just wrapped him in a warm hug all of a sudden. 

Daehwi didn’t quite know what was happening or why it was happening but he could admit that Sohye was pretty good at giving hugs, unwarranted as they may be. After a short while she squeezed him once, tightly, and stepped back a bit, but kept her hands on both of his arms. With more affection than Daehwi had ever heard her use, she said: “You’re an idiot.” 

Before he could ask why, she squeezed his arms once again with a warm smile and said: “Wait here.” 

She hurried back inside as fast as her heels seemed to let her and Daehwi was left alone with a lot of questions but without the weight on his chest that had accumulated over the last two weeks. 

Woojin 

Prom was a nice concept. Celebrating the end of his academical career (for now, he already dreaded packing for college at the end of summer) with all of his friends and people having fun and dancing to overproduced pop music and a lot of balloons- that all contributed to a nice concept. And yet, Woojin couldn’t bring himself to really enjoy it. 

He didn’t know what he’d expected out of this, out of seeing Daehwi again, but what he got was just as little as he’d gotten all week. Nothing. He still hadn’t talked to him and now Daehwi had disappeared somewhere and Sohye had disappeared and Jihoon was busy making heart-eyes at Jinyoung. Woojin usually wouldn’t have been above physically pulling Jihoon away from his date to listen to his whining, but he really liked Jinyoung and he knew that Jihoon _really_ liked Jinyoung and he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself for screwing that up. So he was left sitting at the bar, talking to Yoojung. It weirdly reminded him of their discussion about punch-ingredients at the Bonfire, he just hoped the evening wouldn’t end like that one had as well. 

“Well long story short, Doyeon is out to become prom queen tonight and I plan to physically snatch the crown from the prom kings head. Tell Jihoon I’m sorry in advance.” 

Yoojung didn’t look at all apologetic. 

“Where _is_ Doyeon?”, Woojin asked. 

“I don’t know”, she replied and maybe looked a little bit sheepish. “Some of us lose our girlfriends in crowded rooms, Woojin. Where are all of your friends?” 

“Some of us lose all our friends in crowded rooms, Yoojung.” He hadn’t actually lost anyone, he quite voluntarily abandoned two of them, but Yoojung didn’t need to know that. 

“Well, lucky for you your friends seem to be putting more effort into finding you than you are into finding them.” She pointed behind Woojin in the direction of the door. When he turned around he saw Sohye coming their way. 

“Wonderful, you’re here”, she said and laid a hand on Woojin’s arm before looking at Yoojung. “I’ll need to kidnap this dashing young man for the greater good. I’m loving your suit by the way, does Doyeon have a matching dress?” 

“Doyeon has a matching _suit_ ”, Yoojung corrected. “It’s pretty hot.” She grinned then and patted Woojin’s shoulder once. “I’ll go find my very hot girlfriend now that you found your friends, see you during the crowning ceremony, probably.” 

As soon as she was gone, Sohye started pulling on Woojin’s arm in the direction of the exit. 

“Where are we going?”, Woojin yelled over the noise after he barely avoided falling flat on his face. 

“Outside”, Sohye yelled back, matter-of-factly. 

“No shit.” Woojin rolled his eyes even though Sohye wasn’t looking at him. “Why?” 

“For love.” 

They had made their way through the gym’s door finally and Woojin was just about to inquire what exactly she’d meant by that, when she tugged at his arm once again and pushed him further into that direction, in front of her. 

“Talk to him. And don’t fuck this up, I dare you.” 

She was already making her way back inside when he turned around to ask for more intel, so he had no choice but to try and find out what she was talking about on his own. It was pretty obvious what she had been talking about, when he turned in the direction she had been pushing him in and saw Daehwi looking back at him with earnest surprise on his face. 

His brain short-circuited for a second. Why was Sohye making him talk to Daehwi now of all moments? He still hadn’t told her anything after all. He couldn’t have, even if he’d wanted to, she’d been gone for the majority of the evening up until now. He realized that Daehwi also had been gone for most of it. Had they been together out here? Had 

_Daehwi_ told her anything? 

He must have, and that realization threw Woojin’s brain from short-circuited into overdrive. Why had he told Sohye and what exactly had he said? What about it had made Sohye come inside and get him? Why did she think it was so important to talk about this now? Did she think it was better to just get it over with, like ripping off a bandaid, maybe? Woojin didn’t want to rip off any bandaids tonight. Maybe he should just go back inside and avoid Daehwi for the rest of the evening. Sohye would probably have his head for it but maybe he could manage to avoid her too. 

Before his fight or flight reflexes - definitely favouring towards flight- could kick in, Daehwi was standing in front of him. They were standing a bit to the side, away from the small groups of students gathered around the gym’s entrance, chatting and laughing. The lights that were strung up there, in Woojin’s back, only faintly illuminated Daehwi’s face in front of him but it was enough to cast a kind of soft glow on it that made Woojin’s heart hurt. 

“Did…” Daehwi started, but his voice sounded small and unsure. Woojin’s heart continued hurting. “Did Sohye say why she brought you here, or…?” 

Woojin shook his head and they fell back into silence. He watched Daehwi’s face, trying to catch any hint as to what exactly was happening, but turning up empty. “Will you tell me why she brought me here?”, he tried carefully. 

“I told her.” Daehwi replied after another short bout of silence. “About last weekend.” 

It caught Woojin off-guard and that must have shown on his face, because Daehwi quickly continued: “I know I shouldn’t have, it’s a thing between me and you and I’m sorry if you didn’t want her to know I just- I needed to talk to someone I guess and she asked and she said a whole bunch of weird vague things and-” 

“Hey”, Woojin said and he was surprised how soft his voice sounded even though he was trying to interrupt Daehwi’s flurry of words. He was even more surprised when it worked. “It’s okay”, he added. “I was gonna talk to her about it anyways.” 

Daehwi nodded, the tiniest movement, and then dropped Woojin’s gaze in order to focus on the ground. Woojin thought that this should be going differently. It was their first real conversation after he had left last weekend and it should be going way differently. 

Daehwi looked up again and this time there was something other than the uncertainty in his eyes. “When were you gonna talk to me about it?” 

This was definitely not how this was supposed to go. Daehwi’s voice still sounded small but now there was an accusation in it, an accusation to something Woojin had never intended to do. Or not do, rather. He’d thought he’d been doing the right thing, leaving Daehwi all this space after having left him none at all last weekend, but apparently he’d been wrong. 

“I’m sorry”, he started. “I didn’t mean to... I was just-” 

“Waiting for the right moment to let me down?” The accusation had vanished from Daehwi’s voice and had been replaced with yet something else, something just as hard. 

“What?” 

“I get it, you know? Sometimes you do things that you actually didn’t want to do and then you don’t know how to get out of it. I thought I would’ve been fine with pretending it didn’t happen, but it turns out that I’m not and I realized that it’s because we’re friends and-” He looked directly at Woojin now. “Friends tell each other things and I thought that maybe this counted as one of these things. But apparently it didn’t for you.” 

Woojin could just stare at him, his body not able to keep up with the things his mind was yelling at him. 

_He thinks you regret the kiss! You hurt him! This is your fault! You’re an idiot!_

Daehwi seemed to realize that he wasn’t getting an immediate answer from him, and continued. 

“It counts for me though, so… Here’s to nothing, I guess.” He kicked at the floor, before starting to talk again. 

“In freshman year we bumped into each other once and you helped me pick up my books again. And I thought that you had one of the most beautiful smiles I’d ever seen. A few weeks later I still thought that, when me and Jinyoung went to the first soccer game of the season and you all celebrated after the winning goal. Months later I still thought so, years, and I still do now.” 

He drew in a deep breath and Woojin felt his chest tense up with it. 

“I had the picture perfect example of a highschool crush on you, even though we never really talked to each other. I had this huge crush on the idea of you, on who I thought you were up until a few months ago. Then you came into the junior’s room and asked for our help and we started to hang out and suddenly it wasn’t a crush anymore.” 

The tension in Woojin’s chest expanded to his stomach and his throat and his mind. He wanted to run again, he didn’t want to listen to Daehwi’s next words. He didn’t want to rip off any bandaids tonight if this was what it felt like. 

“I was so scared of getting to know you at first because I thought that it would crush the version of you I had in my mind and I would feel pathetic.” He interrupted himself with a short, hard laugh. “That didn’t happen and I still feel pathetic.” 

_That’s your fault,_ the voice in Woojin’s head sneered at him. He still couldn't bring himself to talk. 

“I liked the idea of you”, Daehwi repeated. “But I fell in love with who you really are.” 

Woojin had often times wondered how often a brain could cease working momentarily before it just gave in completely. He felt like right now was the time he’d find out. 

The thoughts his mind had been yelling at him had swelled to a crescendo and then abruptly stopped in time with Daehwi’s last sentence and now he was just left staring back into Daehwi’s eyes in complete silence. And Daehwi was looking back at him with so much vulnerability and honesty and expectation. 

He had to say something. He didn’t want to make the same mistake he’d made up until now and remain in this complete silence. But with this absolute void he felt like he had stepped in suddenly, all possible things he wanted to tell Daehwi were gone even as he frantically raked his head for them. 

What he finally managed to focus on was: “When I first met you I mixed you up with Guanlin.” 

Daehwi blinked at him and faintly asked: “I… what?” 

“I thought Guanlin was you.” Even reworded, it was a ridiculous sentence but he couldn’t bring himself to shut up. “When I first talked to you about the Bonfire.” 

“O-okay?” Daehwi seemed just as confused about the statement as Woojin was. 

“It’s funny”, he tried again. _No it’s not, you’re ridiculous_ , his mind gave back but he chose to ignore it. “It’s funny”, he repeated. “Because back then I thought you were someone else and now…” He trailed off. This wasn’t going anywhere he wanted it to go. 

Daehwi was still looking at him, still confused, still expectant. 

Woojin started over. “I’m sorry.” He sighed. 

“I’m sorry that I’ve been an idiot and about all the times I said something stupid and made things weird. Or the times I panicked and shut you out completely when I could have just talked to you. And I’m sorry about last weekend.” 

At the last sentence, something in Daehwi’s eyes shifted. Suddenly he didn’t look vulnerable anymore, he looked hurt and it was Woojin’s fault and he couldn’t hold his gaze anymore. 

_Idiot_ , the voice in Woojin’s mind hissed. 

Woojin stumbled over his words when he continued: “But I’m not sorry about what I did! I mean- I am. But- But not about- I don’t-...” He drew in a breath and looked back into Daehwi’s eyes. “I don’t regret kissing you”, he said, his voice as firm as he could manage. “I just regret leaving without talking to you about it.” 

Daehwi looked at him like he was waiting for more. When it didn’t come, he pointed out: “You can talk to me now.” His voice was soft, barely audible and it made Woojin want to step closer, wrap him in his arms and not let go until he was feeling okay again. But he understood that to make this okay again he needed to finally tell Daehwi outright what was up. So that’s what he did. 

“I kissed you because I wanted to and I’m not trying to get out of it. I was worried that _you_ didn’t want it and that’s why I tried to give you space, to tell me how you felt about it… I was pretty stupid.” He huffed out a small nervous laugh before continuing. “But yes, I wanted to kiss you and I wanted to kiss you for weeks and I don’t regret I did it. I’m sorry for being an idiot about it.” 

This time it was Daehwi who dropped his gaze and during the few seconds it took him to react, Woojin’s heart nearly leaped out of his chest. Then Daehwi closed his eyes and chuckled softly and when he looked back at Woojin there was a warm glint in his eyes that brought a tiny smile to Woojin’s lips too. 

“We were both idiots about it”, Daehwi said and Woojin laughed. It felt odd to laugh after the tension and uncertainty of the last few minutes but at the same time it felt like the most natural thing in the world. To laugh and look at Daehwi’s smile and to see the warmth in his eyes and to finally _know_ instead of wondering, questioning, imagining. 

“So what happens now?” Daehwi was still smiling when Woojin asked and Woojin hoped he’d never stop. 

“I believe this is the part where ‘Heroes’ by David Bowie starts playing and we ride off into the sunset on a lawnmower”, Daehwi replied. 

“The sun went down an hour ago, there is no lawnmower in our general proximity and they’re playing Drake right now”, Woojin pointed out while throwing a look at the gym’s entrance where the music was coming from. 

Daehwi shrugged. “Details”, he gave back, grabbed a hold on Woojin’s hand and attempted to pull him back towards the gym. But Woojin didn’t move and easily pulled Daehwi closer to him instead. 

He kept their fingers intertwined when Daehwi wasn’t more than a few inches away from him and brought his other hand up to cup his face. 

Their second kiss was slower, sweeter somehow than their first and this time Woojin knew exactly what he was doing. When he felt Daehwi smile against his lips he knew that it was the right thing. 

He pulled away slightly after a few seconds and smiled. “Yeah, details.” 

______________________

“Well anyways, long story short: I did this and you’re welcome.” 

Sohye leaned back in her seat with a satisfied smile that didn’t fall even when Woojin rolled his eyes. 

“We would have gotten there on our own at some point-”, he tried to object but was stopped by Daehwi’s hand on his arm. 

“No we wouldn’t have”, he pointed out. 

“You wouldn’t have”, Zhengting agreed as he set down a cup of coffee in front of Jihoon. 

Generally everyone present in the café seemed to be against Woojin, so he just jutted out his bottom lip and chose to ignore all of them in favour for his chocolate ice cream. 

His friends quickly returned to whatever conversations they’d had before Sohye decided to tell the great tale of romance she had made possible and Woojin was fine with just sitting there and enjoying the atmosphere. 

Jihoon and Guanlin were discussing a list of songs Jihoon had scribbled into his pink dotted notebook. Guanlin was trying to tell him how big of a deal it was to add songs to the ridiculously long playlist that the juniors had had for years now apparently and Jihoon seemed to not care because “Carly Rae Jepsen definitely needs to be on there, Guanlin.” 

Sohye and Somi weren’t really talking to each other they were just taking turns quoting a song from a musical Woojin had never heard of, but they made it sound like a conversation and Jinyoung in between them seemed utterly confused. 

Daehwi next to him was listening to Hyungseob telling him a very elaborated story about something Euiwoong had told him. Hyungseob in turn was definitely supposed to be doing something else, more productive, Woojin guessed, but he just ignored his responsibilities and resumed wiping the same spot on the table while babbling on. He was interrupted by Zhengting coming back from the kitchen and hitting him on the head with a towel. 

“Do your job”, he laughed, while setting down a bowl of ice cream in front of Daehwi. 

Woojin couldn’t tell what any of the flavours were from their vibrant colours. The bowl had pink and yellow and blue and somehow it made Woojin smile fondly as Daehwi started eating. 

“What?” Daehwi asked when he noticed the look on Woojin’s face. He had the spoon halfway up to his mouth and a tiny bit of the blue ice cream was stuck to the corner of his lips. 

“Nothing” Woojin replied, then leaned forward quickly and placed a small peck on Daehwi’s lips, partly because they had ice cream stuck to them, partly because he just felt like it and he could do that now. 

When he leaned back again he saw a faint blush on Daehwi’s cheeks and chuckled. 

“You’re a lot like that ice cream, you know?” 

The blush on Daehwi’s face didn’t fade even as he scrunched up his eyebrows. “How?” 

“It’s pretty and colourful and really sweet”, Woojin explained with a grin. 

It earned him a hit on the arm and a groan but it also earned him a small blushy smile and Daehwi lacing their fingers together and he thought it was all pretty perfect. 

The two of them together like this, with all of their friends around them and ice cream and the fairylights Zhengting had strung up across the whole room last week, and Daehwi’s smile when he had first seen it. It was all pretty and colourful and some kind of perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i seriously procrastinated editing this because i feel really weird about being done. its only been three chapters and i kinda started writing this ironically but i got really, REALLY attached to it and now its all out here...wow. 
> 
> i hope you all enjoyed this and if you got this far: thank you for reading! 
> 
> if you have any questions or things to say or wanna be friends or you're interested about other stuff i'm writing come find me on [twitter](http://twitter.com/lilaliacs)!!


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